William Wesley Morris

William Wesley "Wildcat" Morris was born on September 13, 1927, in Enid, Oklahoma, the youngest of twelve children, and came to Las Vegas in 1937. He was a star of the Las Vegas High School football team and went on to the University of Nevada, Reno, where he lettered in football and graduated in 1949 with a degree in physical education. While serving on the Washington, D.C. staff of Nevada Senator Pat McCarran, and later Senator Alan Bible, he attended American University and earned his law degree in 1959.

Morris returned to Las Vegas in 1959, passed the Nevada Bar, and set up practice as a partner in the law firm of Christensen, Bell & Morris. He served as an associate municipal judge from 1960 to 1961 and as a special deputy attorney general from 1961 to 1962, and in 1966 he sought the Democratic nomination for Nevada attorney general. Active in party affairs, he served as an alternate delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 1960 and 1964 and sat on the State Democratic Central Committee and the Clark County Central Committee.

Beyond the law, Morris became one of Nevada's most influential civic figures of the late twentieth century. He served as a University Regent from 1971 to 1975 and as a member of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board from 1980 to 1983, and he was named a Distinguished Nevadan at the 1978 UNLV commencement. A tireless champion of higher education and athletics, he co-founded the UNLV Football Foundation, helped secure funding for the Silver Bowl and the Thomas & Mack Center, and lent his support to numerous Las Vegas charities. He died on July 17, 1998, at the age of 70.