William A. Hockings was born in 1928 in Minneapolis, Minnesota; however he attended high school in Crystal Falls, Michigan. In 1946 he enrolled at the Michigan College of Mining and Technology (later Michigan Technological University), graduating in 1950 with a B.S. in chemistry. He joined Calumet and Hecla, Inc. in 1951 as a research engineer. He later joined the staff as an assistant professor of mineral research at the Michigan College of Mining and Technology in 1955 as one of the original members of the staff of the Institute of Mineral Research (IMR). He worked on highly applied sponsored research projects and state-supported basic projects. With co-workers he developed a cyanide leaching process for recovering copper from White Pine flotation plant tailings which received a United States patent. He also did basic research on the mechanisms and kinetics of reduction of iron oxides and a hot stage microscope method he developed had wide applications in research. Hockings became assistant director of the IMR in 1970.