Dr. William Buckingham passed away Jan. 20, 2020, in Encinitas, Calif., at the age of 97. Bill was born on Sept. 11, 1922, and raised in Grand Forks before serving in the Army during WWII as a medical corpsman on Guam and Guadalcanal. After the war, Bill received a bachelor's degree at UND and continued on to medical school in Winston-Salem, N.C., graduating as a General Practitioner physician.

Bill practiced in Fargo, Hillsboro and Elgin, North Dakota before settling with his family in Bismarck in 1960. In 1975, along with Dr. Dunnigan, he became the first director of the Family Practice Residency Program in Bismarck. He served the North Dakota Academy of Family Physicians for many years as a secretary-treasurer, president and as the North Dakota Family Physician of the Year in 1982. He was also active as a delegate for the American Academy of Family Physicians Congress of Delegates.

Community and service was important to him. Bill was twice elected to the City Council and also served as the City Health Official. He was the volunteer physician for the Golden Gloves program for many years, and was on the founding board for the Missouri Valley Family YMCA. He was also involved with the Amigos de las Americas program, training and supervising volunteers to provide medical care to poor areas of Central America. Bill was asked to re-enter the military and did so, serving as commanding officer of the 193rd Medical Detachment and finally retiring as a full colonel in the North Dakota National Guard.

Bill retired from medicine and moved to California in 1997. He was preceded in death by his wife, Marion (Grimm) on March 4 of 2018.

He is survived by his children, Mike and wife Gina, California; Ann and husband Mohamed, Saudi Arabia; and Vie and husband Paul, Texas; along with 10 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.