A LIFE OF COURAGE, LOYALTY AND SERVICE
GO TO WORK HAPPY AND COME HOME TIRED: This mantra was Bill Adams’ sustaining principle through 32 years of service with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
From his start as a uniformed constable in small Manitoba communities and culminating as the Superintendent in charge of the Serious and Organized Crime Intelligence Branch in Headquarters Ottawa, his years were marked by personal and professional challenges that were sometimes thrilling, occasionally frightening, often tragic but never dull.
Bill’s legacy within the RCMP and the Canadian public is less about his individual accomplishments and more about his loyalty to the organization and his fellow officers, his empathy for those whose lives he intersected through the fate and circumstance of life, and the mentoring that he freely gave to the succeeding generation with the RCMP.
Always the optimist, Bill perhaps makes light of the sometimes-adverse impacts of a career in law enforcement on officers and their loved ones. He celebrates the role of his family in keeping him focused on what matters most. He modestly relates the occasions in his career that clearly called on deep resources of physical courage, but it is the moments of moral courage that shine through.