- Born
- Died
- William A. Leising was born on March 31, 1913 in East Amherst, New York, USA. He died on May 10, 2007 in Medford, Oregon, USA.
- After initially beginning his higher pre-medicine studies at St. Bonaventure College in Olean, N.Y., he decided to enter the Roman Catholic religious congregation of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in Tewksbury, Mass., in 1933. After finishing his theological studies at Oblate College in Washington D.C., he was ordained to the priesthood by Cardinal Francis Spellman on May 27, 1940.
Fr. Leising received his first assignment to the Arctic Missions of the Mackenzie, Canada, and spent 25 years in those Missions. He began by learning the Chipewayan language. The first ten years he often traveled by dog sled to reach the missions under his care, as well as by boat in the summers. - Flew airplanes into the Arctic Circle to retrieve people who needed medical attention. A book about Father Leising's flying adventures, "Arctic Wings" was published by Doubleday in 1959 and sold a million copies from 1960 to 1970.
- In 1945, he produced an hour long film documentary entitled "Arctic Missions of the Mackenzie", with the support of Cardinal Spellman of New York. In 1949, he was sent to Aklavik, on the Mackenzie Delta, and was instrumental in setting up a radio station which broadcast in both the Eskimo and English languages.
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