The 67 year-old retiree had overseen Tocumwal's railway museum at the town's historic weatherboard station for the past five years.

Mr Williams died on November 7 after a long battle with cancer and his funeral will be held this Friday.

Fellow Tocumwal Lions Club member Sandra Williams (no relation) lauded Mr Williams for his devotion to the museum which is managed by the service group.

"Even when he was in the middle of chemotherapy he was up there working and getting things done," she said.

"He was just an all-round nice guy who liked doing things for people.

"If you asked him a question about a steam train built 60 years ago he would know the answer, he was that sort of bloke."

The Border Mail visited the museum in April this year and Mr Williams enthusiastically showed off the collection of railway artefacts and he spoke of his desire to further tourism.

His wife Judy said: "He wanted to get more trains up here and more groups, that was one of the things he wanted to do, but how he was going to do that was another thing.

"He had these visions of what he wanted to do but he just ran out of time."

Mr Williams was born in May 1955 in Ballarat and was the oldest of four children.

After being educated in the gold rush city, he joined the army, doing initial training at the Kapooka base near Wagga before being station at various times in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

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Mr Williams met Judy in 1977 when they both serving in the army at barracks in Watsonia in north-east Melbourne.

They wed at the Blackburn Church of Christ in the same city in 1979 and had two daughters Joanne and Amanda in 1987 and 1990 respectively.

Mr Williams ended his defence force career in 1996 and had other jobs in Melbourne before retiring to the Cobram region in 2017.

Mrs Williams said the appeal of living somewhere with a train connection was the primary driver for coming to the area and settling at Yarroweyah.

In addition to his Lions Club involvement, Mr Williams was also active with the Cobram Men's Shed.

Mr Williams was diagnosed with cancer in his appendix in 2019 and at the time told he had a 40 per cent chance of surviving for five years.

His funeral will be held from 2pm this Friday at the Yarroweyah Memorial Hall on the Murray Valley Highway with a private cremation to occur afterwards.

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