Friends recall a favorite saying of the late Scott Williams of Monroeville.
“There’s a right way, there’s a wrong way, and then there’s the Gateway.”
A paraplegic since the age of 18, Williams, 59, died July 26, 2024, at UPMC Montefiore Hospital in Oakland after a prolonged battle with cancer.
In addition to serving on the Gateway School Board for more than two decades, Williams was on the Forbes Road Career and Technology Center School Board for nine years, served as president of the Pitcairn Baseball Association for many years, and also spent time coaching.
In May 1983, Williams became paralyzed in a baseball accident. He dove head-first into home plate, hitting his head off the catcher’s leg. Williams endured a cervical fracture that lead to his paralysis, friend and fellow Gateway school board member Jack Bova said.
But Williams maintained a positive outlook.
“Scotty was incredible. He never let his disability stop him,” school board member Valerie Warning said.
“We never saw the chair,” said longtime friend Kevin Dick, who grew up with Williams in Pitcairn.
“He had a refreshing outlook and a wry sense of humor about his situation. And that is how he referred to it, his ‘situation’, never his ‘disability’,” Bova said.
“He made people feel comfortable around him,” said Scotty’s younger brother. Doug Williams. “He really was a people person.”
When the school board voted to add a ramp to the north entrance of Gateway High School, it was christened as “Scotty Williams Way.”
“It was finally put in for all people to access the building that were in wheelchairs,” Warning said. “Scotty had been in a wheelchair for 40 years.”
In December 2022, Williams was diagnosed with colorectal cancer. According to Dick, Williams’ first surgery was 17 hours long. He had multiple followup surgeries, but the cancer kept returning.
“Scott would fight it, and it just kept coming back,” Bova said. “He just kept battling.”
Former school board member and Monroeville resident Dave Magill also knew Williams from playing baseball.
“We grew up in the same neighborhood and I knew Scotty very well, even though I was older than he was,” Magill said. “He was a huge sports fan.”
Williams earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Edinboro University .
“He really blossomed when he went off to college,” said Williams’ sister Stacey Versaw. She said her brother belonged to a fraternity and was a DJ during his time at Edinboro.
After graduation, Williams was offered a position with the FBI in Fairmont, W. Va. He decided to stay in the area because of his medical needs and health care coverage, his sister said.
“That’s when he really got involved in the community and the kids,” Versaw added.
Williams was able set goals and accomplish them, and was always advocating for the students, friends recalled.
“He was truly a pillar of the community,” Magill said. “He had so many hours on the board and behind the scenes. … Scotty brought so much light. He breathed and lived Gateway.”
Williams was preceded in death by his parents. Frank and Elaine Williams. He is survived by two brothers, Doug and Robert and two sisters, Stacey Versaw and Stephanie Raucci, and three nephews.
“Scotty was the leader and patriarch of our family,” Doug Williams said. “He was one of a kind.”
Funeral arrangements were handled by the Soxman Funeral Home in Penn Hills.
“The funeral home was packed,” Dick said. “There was a line out the door and down the street. Everyone loved Scotty.”
Leslie Savisky is a Tribune-Review contributing writer.