Many Zionsville children lost a “second grandfather” when Bill Moore, longtime art coordinator of the Boys & Girls Club of Boone County’s Zionsville Unit, died Nov. 18, the unit’s director, Glenn Sanford, said.
Moore, who died of prostate cancer less than a month before his 81st birthday, had worked at the unit for 11 years.
“He was kind of like Peter Pan. He never really grew up,” Moore’s daughter Katie Williams said. “He identified with children, and they identified with them.”
Moore, who because of declining health had to stop working at the club in 2020, talked about his love for the kids he worked with until the end of his life, Williams said.
“His time there was extremely meaningful and valued,” Williams said. “All of the kids there were very special to him, and up until the end of his life he was still talking about them.”
When he was younger, Bill Moore was an aspiring actor, according to his former daughter-in-law Zoe Moore, who is still close to the family. He went to California to become an actor and was in a commercial, Zoe Moore said, but becoming a professional actor didn’t materialize. However, he lived by the motto, “Love the art in you.”
Later in life, after he retired from a career selling furniture at a now closed Lazurus store in Castleton, Bill Moore then sought a way to continue his love for the arts, and he found it in screenwriting.
“He wrote a few different pieces, and one was a short movie that he wrote (and was) filmed called ‘Catching the Light,’” Zoe Moore said. “Even in his last days on Earth, he was working on another screenplay that he had been working on for a long time about a kid’s baseball team and basing it on his experience when he coached his kids in baseball. He was all about drama and art and super creative.”
In retirement, Bill Moore also found a renewed calling at the Boys & Girls Club of Boone County’s Zionsville Unit as its art coordinator. He created programming for children, encouraging them to love the art in themselves.
“I’d be out at sporting events for my kids and people would say, ‘Oh, Bill’s your father-in-law? Oh, my god, my son loves him so much,’” Zoe Moore said. “There were so many times where people made mention of how much their kids loved him, so he obviously made a big impact on parents and their kids in Zionsville while he was working there.”
Sanford said the arts are one of the club’s five areas of programming. Bill Moore planned programming for the fine arts and drama program. The programming incorporated art, acting and drama and emotional wellness.
“He empowered the kids to get up on stage and (do) public speaking and get to know one another,” Sanford said. “Bill was great at that. BIll was always my go-to for new kids at the Boys & Girls Club. I’d always bring them to the art room to meet Bill because there was nobody better to welcome them. He had a way about him and got to know the kids and knew how to make them feel special.”
Bill Moore’s family had a private funeral for close friends and family. Donations in his memory can be made to the Boys & Girls Club of Boone County at bgcboone.org.
“There were thousands of kids he would have encountered in his career,” Sanford said. “He was a second grandfather to them. He cared for them and loved them just like any loving grandfather would do.”
Bill Moore is survived by his wife, Diane Moore; his adult children, Bill, Jason and David Moore, Stephanie Weitkamp and Katie Williams; and several grandchildren.
