Rick Williams

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Biography

Rick was born in Meridian, MS in 1945. The family moved to Brewton, AL around 1950 where the family managed the restaurant in the Lovelace Hotel. After a few years the family moved to Demopolis, AL to open their own restaurant. I think the name of the restaurant was "Homer's" The family moved back to Brewton around 1956 and started the "Old South" Restaurant.

His father, Homer, committed suicide in 1959. This left his mother, Sarah Margaret, managing the restaurant.

In 1960 Rick attended Marion Military Institute (MMI) in Marion, AL. and remained at that school until half way through the junior year (1962). He was expelled. The time at Marion was a bad time for Rick and he got into trouble frequently. His studies were basically ignored with him doing the absolute minimum to get by.

In 1962 Rick moved to Chickasaw, AL (Mobile suburb) to finish the junior year at Vigor high school. He stayed at his cousin's (Joyce (Walker) Sentel) home while attending Vigor. At the end of junior year at Vigor he moved back to Brewton and attended T.R. Miller high school for his senior year.

Upon graduation in 1963 Rick enrolled at United Electronics Labs (UEL) in Birmingham, AL. He stayed at the Essex House Hotel (as most of the students did) during his time there.

Upon graduation from the 18 month electronics course at UEL, he found a job with Western Electric and worked all around the state of Alabama based in Brewton. In Sep 1965 he married his long time girlfriend Sarah Watson from Brewton. She was attending Auburn University at the time and continued her studies there until she graduated in 1967.

In 1966 he received his draft notice (this was during the Vietnam war). He volunteered for a four year stint in the Army Security Agency. He trained at Ft. Devens, MA and was assigned to Kagnew Station, Asmara, Ethopia. Sarah was with him in Massachusetts and followed him to Asmara in 1968.

At the end of his Army service in 1970 he and Sarah returned to Brewton and he resumed working for Western Electric based in Selma, AL. In 1972 Sarah was attending Summer session at the University of Alabama (UA) at Tuscaloosa and was offered a Teaching Assistant position. At that time Rick decided to enroll full time at UA in Electrical Engineering. Sarah and Rick moved to Tuscaloosa where Sarah was a teaching assistant and studied for her Masters degree in Math. Sarah and Rick graduated in 1976, Sarah with her classwork for her PhD in Math completed and Rick with a BSEE. Sarah completed her dissertation in 1979 and received her PhD.

After graduation, Rick got a job with International Paper (IP) in the Engineering Process Control group in Mobile, AL. Sarah found a position as an instructor teaching math and computer science at the University of South Alabama.

In 1977 Rick and Sarah had a son, Chris. They had another son, Jeff, in 1980.

In 1979, Sarah went to work for IP at their Computer Center in Mobile. In 1997, both Rick and Sarah were working in the Technology group of IP and were transferred to Loveland, OH. They both retired from IP at the end of 2005.

In 2015 they moved to Alexandria, VA to be close to their two son's families who lived in the DC metro area.

Sources

• Bio as recalled by Rick