Harry Willson's formal schooling include a B.A. in chemistry and math at Lafayette College, Easton, PA, 1953 a Master of Divinity in ancient mid-east language and literature at Princeton Theological Seminary. He became bilingual through one year of Spanish Studies at the University of Madrid, and he studied Spanish, literature, philosophy, mythology and theater arts at the University of New Mexico. He has the Diploma de Espanol como Lengua Extranjera from the University of Salamanca. He served as student pastor at the Presbyterian Church, Hamburg, NJ, for four years while in seminary. In 1958 he moved his family to New Mexico, where he served as bi-lingual missionary pastor, in Bernalillo, Alameda and Placitas for eight years. He served as Permanent Clerk of the Presbytery of Rio Grande, Chairman of Enlistments and Candidates, Chairman of the Commission on Race, and Moderator of the Presbytery.

In 1966 he left the church. He taught school for ten years, at the Albuquerque Academy and at Sandia Preparatory School. In 1976 he became self-employed, and he began to build a body of work as a writer. In 1986, he and his wife Adela Amador founded Amador Publishers. Throughout his life, Harry was an activist in peace and justice causes. In 1965 he answered Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s call for clergy to go to Selma, Alabama to assist in voter registration and demonstrations again police brutality in the wake of "Bloody Sunday.

" He participated in the successful march from Selma to Montgomery on March 25, where he personally witnessed Dr. King deliver his "How Long, Not Long" speech. In later years he joined the movement to stop radioactive dumping in New Mexico. He was a long-time member of the Humanist Society of New Mexico. Harry's work has been hard to classify, according to genre. He considered his outlook "planetary, unitary, peacemaking, anti-racist and anti-sexist, sensing the importance of the inner, curious, sensual, mythic.".