Background
Williams was born in Attapulgus, Georgia, a small city in the far southwest corner of the state in Decatur County. Both of his parents were teenagers committed to a trade institute for the blind in Macon. Because of fear of his parent's response to her having become an unwed mother, she ran away from the institute upon learning of her pregnancy. At the age of 28, Williams stumbled upon his birth father, "Blind" Willie Wiggins, by accident in Florida. His mother died during childbirth when he was ten years old. He was reared by his mother's parents, Lelar and Turner Williams. He left home by age 14.
Williams served with the United States Army during World War II in an all-African-American unit under General George S. Patton, Jr. He advanced to the rank of Staff Sergeant. Williams was the only survivor of a Nazi bombing, which left him in a hospital in Europe for more than a year and earned him a Purple Heart.
After the war, he earned a high school diploma at age twenty-three, then a bachelor's degree and a master's degree (both in chemistry) from Atlanta's Morris Brown College and Atlanta University (present day Clark Atlanta University). Williams is a member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity.
In the early 1950s, Williams married Juanita Terry and worked for the United States Department of Agriculture as a research scientist. Williams had four sons: Hosea L. Williams, II, Andre Williams, Torrey Williams, and Hyron Williams ,and four daughters: Barbara Emerson, Elizabeth Omilami, Yolanda Favors, and Jaunita Collier. Williams was preceded in death by his wife and son Hosea, II.
Read more about this topic: Hosea Williams
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality can disturb us.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“They were more than hostile. In the first place, I was a south Georgian and I was looked upon as a fiscal conservative, and the Atlanta newspapers quite erroneously, because they didn’t know anything about me or my background here in Plains, decided that I was also a racial conservative.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“In the true sense one’s native land, with its background of tradition, early impressions, reminiscences and other things dear to one, is not enough to make sensitive human beings feel at home.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)