William Wykoff was born in Corry, Pa. where he grew up during the railroad era. During the summers he worked alongside his grandfather, Will Dingfelder, in the fields of the family farm. Determined to learn more about his German ancestors, he went to live with a family in Hesse after military service in 1956, and returned to Berlin as a student after graduating from Pennsylvania State University in 1960. He earned his doctorate at Cornell University. He conducted field research among the Iroquois and in SW China. After an academic career at Oberlin College and the Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University, he retired to Rochester, NY where his wife Manying is employed at the University of Rochester Medical Center.