The Force in the North

Staff Sergeant Bill Pringle

Bill was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1933, but left the United States during World War II at the age of 11 to live out his adolescence in his parents’ Cape Breton.

At 19, he joined the RCMP and spent three years working close to home. His first posting to Aklavik, NWT, however, in 1955, would put him in the North forever.

Before he retired in 1983, Bill served in cities and villages in both territories, including Spence Bay (now Tuktoyaktuk, NWT), Fort St. John, Fort Smith, Inuvik, Yellowknife and Whitehorse, to name just a few places. He chose to retire in Carcross, Yukon, where the local library is named after his late wife, Isabelle Pringle.

Bill married Linda (Garner) from Old Crow in 1988. The couple served in Carcross as justices of the peace until the mid 1990s.  Bill also worked for 15 years as a bus driver and volunteered as an ambulance driver and attendant, and with the local fire department.  Today, he volunteers with the local recreation committee and is an executive member of the gun club, which he co-founded.  Bill and Linda both serve as members of the board at the Isabel Pringle Library.