Archie Williams

Archie Williams (actually Archibald Franklin Williams, born May 1, 1915 in Oakland, California, † June 24, 1993 in Fairfax, California ) was an American sprinter and Olympic gold medalist.

Williams had as an athlete only a great year, more than others reached at this time but throughout life. He was the first running workout at San Mateo Junior College, now the College of San Mateo. Later he moved to Berkeley, studied mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley and continued his running training. Before 1936 it was never have been able to undercut 47 seconds over 440 yards, but at the NCAA Championships in 1936 in Chicago, he was in top form and made with 46.1 seconds a world record.

At the Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936, he also presented himself at his best and won the gold medal in the 400 -meter run, before the British Godfrey Brown ( silver ) and the American James LuValle (bronze).

A complicated injury to the thigh muscle ended his athletic career in 1937, and after graduating from 1939 he took as part of the Civilian Pilot Training Program (CPT ) in the occupation of pilots on airliners. He was one of 91 African- Americans who received their private pilot's license in the first year of the CPT's program. He then worked for an airline services company at Oakland Airport and acquired the flight instructor license. As of August 1941, he was civilian instructor at the Tuskegee Army Flying School in Tuskegee (Alabama ). Training as a fighter pilot was denied him, and he took as a pilot on Meteorology Aviation Cadet Program of the United States Army Air Forces ( USAAF) in part. In Tuskegee, he was from 1943 with the rank of 2nd Lieutenant in charge of the weather forecast. From September 1944 he is a flight instructor for the Tuskegee Airmen -.

During the Korean War he was stationed at the 20th Weather Squadron in Nagoya, Japan. Further stations during the Cold Kriwges were Long Iceland and Alaska, and finally the March Air Force Base, Riverside County, California, where he left the military with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel on 31 May 1964. He then worked for a year as a teacher in Riverside and moved to Marin County in 1965 and taught as a teacher of mathematics and physics up to the age of 72 years, at the Sir Francis Drake High School in San Anselmo.

Williams was a member of the first African American fraternity Alpha Phi Alpha ( ΑΦΑ ).

He was married to Vesta Williams and left two sons, Carlos and Archie Jr.