Hosea Williams

Infobox Person
name=Hosea L. Williams


caption=Hosea Williams addressing participants in the Religious Action Center of Reformed Judaism's Freedom Ride in 1999.
dead=dead
birth_date=birth date|1926|1|5|mf=y
birth_place=Attapulgus, Georgia
death_date=death date and age|2000|11|16|1926|1|5
death_place=Atlanta, Georgia

Hosea Lorenzo Williams (January 5, 1926 – November 16, 2000) was a United States civil rights leader, ordained minister, and later a politician. His famous motto was "Unbought and Unbossed" (which was also the motto of congresswoman Shirley Chisholm).

Background

Williams was born in Attapulgus, Georgia. Both of his parents were teenagers committed to a trade institute for the blind in Macon. His mother ran away from the institute upon learning of her pregnancy. Williams never knew his father. His mother died while giving birth to her second child. He was raised by his mother's parents, Lela 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 Patton. 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 23, 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 was a member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity.

In the early 1950s Williams married Juanita Terry and worked for the United States Department of Agriculture. They have a son, Hosea L. Williams, II and a daughter, Elizabeth Omilami. Williams was preceded in death by his wife and son.

Civil Rights

He ended up in a hospital for over a month after being seriously beaten for using a drinking fountain marked "whites only". He was arrested for other protests more than 125 times.

He first joined the NAACP, but later became a leader in the SCLC along with Martin Luther King, Jr., Joseph Lowery, and Andrew Young among many others. He played an important role in the demonstrations in St. Augustine, Florida that led directly to the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 [http://finduslaw.com/civil_rights_act_of_1964_cra_title_vii_equal_employment_opportunities_42_us_code_chapter_21 Civil Rights Act of 1964] ] . He also led the first 1965 march on Selma, Alabama, and was beaten unconscious, leaving him with a fractured skull and a severe concussion. The Selma to Montgomery March led to the other great legislative accomplishment of the movement, the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

After leaving SCLC, Williams played a role in supporting strikes in the Atlanta area by black workers who had first been hired because of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

In 1974, he organized the International Wrestling League (IWL), base in Atlanta, Georgia, with Thunderbolt Patterson serving as president. The promotion ran three cards before folding.

In politics, he served on the Atlanta City Council and in the Georgia General Assembly. In 1972 Williams was a candidate in the primaries for U.S. Senator from Georgia. In 1976 he supported former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter for president. He surprised many black civil rights figures in 1980 by joining Ralph Abernathy and Charles Evers and endorsing Ronald Reagan. By 1984, however, he had soured on Reagan's policies, and returned to the Democrats.

In 1987 he led another nationally-covered march, this one consisting of 75 people in Forsyth County, Georgia, which at the time (before becoming a major exurb of northern metro Atlanta) had no non-white residents. He and the others were assaulted with stones and other objects by the KKK and other white supremacists. Another march the following week brought 20,000 people and an enormous showing of police and sheriff department officers, plus national media. Forsyth County, which at one time had a sign at the county line warning people who were not white not to be in the county after sundown, rapidly integrated following Hosea's demonstration, due, in part, to the availability of reasonably priced housing, a rarity in metro Atlanta. Forsyth is no longer considered merely an exurb of Atlanta but is a rapidly growing suburb.

In 1989, he unsuccessfully ran against Maynard Jackson for mayor of Atlanta.

Later life

He founded Hosea Feed the Hungry and Homeless, a non-profit foundation widely known in Atlanta for providing hot meals, haircuts, clothing, and other free services for the needy on Thanksgiving, Christmas, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Easter Sunday each year. Williams' daughter Elizabeth Omilami serves as head of the foundation.

He also became somewhat infamous in his later years for his erratic driving, he was charged with DUI over a dozen times and never found guilty.Fact|date=January 2008

Both his wife and his son, Hosea Williams II, died prior to his own death.

Williams died at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta, after a three-year battle with cancer. Services were held at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, where close friend Dr. Martin Luther King was once the pastor. He was buried at Lincoln Cemetery.

Hosea frequented "CHOPS," a fine dining restaurant where he was known for regular dining and drinking. The restaurant even had a special drink key for Hosea that properly charged him for an unusual beverage that was his own favorite concoction.

Hosea L Williams Drive

Boulevard Drive in the southeastern area of Atlanta was renamed as Hosea L Williams Drive shortly before Williams died. Hosea Williams Drive runs by the site of his former home in the East Lake neighborhood at the intersection of Hosea Williams Drive and East Lake Drive.

Hosea Williams Drive is in the DeKalb County portion of Atlanta and originates at Moreland Avenue, running east-west through the communities of Edgewood, Kirkwood, and East Lake. The street ends at Candler Road.

External links

* [http://www.splcenter.org/pdf/dynamic/legal/mckinneyvsouthern_complaint.pdf "Williams v. Forsyth County Defense League"] Federal-court complaint by Hosea Williams
* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C00E0D6123BF934A25752C1A9669C8B63 Hosea Williams, 74, Rights Crusader, Dies] "By DANIEL LEWIS", November 17, 2000
* [http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2721 "New Georgia Encyclopedia: Hosea Williams (1926-2000)"] Biographical information
* [http://www.hoseafeedthehungry.com/ Hosea Feed the Hungry and Homeless Official Site]

Footnotes