William “Bill” Hettler
NOAA Beaufort Lab Oral Histories
Interviews with retired staff of NOAA Beaufort Lab, documenting their academic background, career path, research focus, and reflections on their work in the lab.
- Mr. Bill Hettler was born in Chicago and was raised in San Antonio, Texas.
- Bill attended the University of Texas and received his Bachelor’s Degree in 1960.
- After graduation he was commission as an officer in the U.S. Navy and spent the next few years stationed in the western Pacific.
- Upon leaving active Service, Bill enrolled in the Master’s Degree Program at the University of Texas and received his degree in 1964.
- He was hired by the Beaufort Laboratory in 1964 and for his first few years worked for the Lab’s Menhaden Program handling fishery-dependent data for the gulf menhaden fishery.
- For a majority of his career, Bill was involved with spawning and rearing marine fishes, especially menhaden; several of his major publications focused on fish spawning methodologies and descriptions of fish eggs and larvae.
- Late in his career, Bill surveyed ichthyoplankton ingress and egress adjacent several major North Carolina inlets.
He retired from the Beaufort Laboratory in 1998.
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