Butch Williams' life has been one of achievement

         Those of us who for decades have known Wayne Williams Jr. -- always "Butch" to just about everyone -- know that he has been an achiever all his life. And a battler.
     We admire that. We have for all those years.

The Williams family -- at the Frisco (Texas) Bowl, December 2017

     He was, when we first knew him in the mid-1960s, a darned good athlete. Not a superstar, but he was a difference maker. And it was that way in his career, too.
     Whether it was in athletics, as a player and coach, or in education, as a teacher or administrator, he met with success -- and earned respect.  
     He always has been a big man in Minden, Louisiana -- and Webster Parish -- and his family has been a treasured one in that area, especially in education.
     Most proudly, he was -- to use an expression we favor -- the son of the father. Wayne Jr. (Butch) followed Wayne Sr.'s career path -- teaching and coaching, then school administration, from high school principal to the same job:  superintendent of Webster Parish Schools.
     And Irene Williams ("Mama Rene") -- Sr.'s wife, Jr.'s mother -- was right there -- for 34 years the school secretary at Minden High.  
      It was a dynasty of sorts.

The young just-married couple, April 1969

     But Butch's biggest achievement, as I am sure he said repeatedly over the years, is the family he and Ki built over nearly 49 years of marriage.
     She was Karen Marlowe of Mangham, Louisiana, when they began dating and fell in love as students at Louisiana Tech University in the late 1960s and married in the spring of 1969, a few months before Butch's senior football season.
      Three sons and six grandkids are their pride and joy.
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      Here is the reality: For more than a decade, Butch faced an opponent tougher than Springhill and Northwestern State in football or Jesuit and Bossier (in baseball). Cancer sucks.
      Even as schools superintendent, he worked through the early battles. After his retirement (in June 2011), his life -- with Ki -- was his kids and grandkids, his love of gardening, staying in touch with friends, and following Louisiana Tech athletics. 
      But cancer kept striking. It attacked his neck and his liver last summer; a Facebook post on Aug. 11 told of his infusion treatments. And the couple of times we spoke in the fall, he told me about the every-other-week treatments in Baton Rouge -- where son Trey (Wayne III) lives -- so it was a difficult, demanding process.
      It sapped his strength; it took his hair. He no longer was the beefy guy who -- after being tried in several positions -- bulked up to 235 pounds and became an all-conference offensive tackle ... in front of quarterback Terry Bradshaw. 
      Still, he was hopeful, optimistic ... but cautious.
      Time now is precious, and it is short. Prayers are in order.
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      The personal connection: We arrived at Louisiana Tech at the same time, as freshmen in August 1965. He was a football linebacker and end, or had been at Minden High; I was a student sports information assistant.
      Butch for years was a good source for stories and background information on high school athletics and Tech football (especially about our years there, the Phil Robertson and Bradshaw years at quarterback).
      When he was coaching and afterward, Butch was a cooperative media source. But not always a happy one. I remember a young coach not being enamored with a few stories or columns -- slanted, he said -- written by a young sportswriter. Oh, well. But ... always friends.
      In early December, when he did not reply to phone and Facebook messages and an e-mail we sent him, seeking info on Tech's 1969 football bowl game, it was unusual. And not a good sign.
      So, it was a pleasure -- a treat -- to see Butch and Ki at Tech's pregame Frisco Bowl gathering in late December.
      It was nice to be with our son and two oldest grandsons that evening, but to visit with Butch for a few minutes -- twice -- was even better than Tech's rout of SMU.
      He was feeling good that night and that week, and detailed his health issues. He apologized for not getting back to me and assuring me that rumors that the seniors on Tech's  football team in 1969 did not want to play in the Grantland Rice Bowl in Baton Rouge -- Bradshaw's last Tech game -- were not accurate, that as team captains, he and center John Harper urged their teammates to relish the experience.
      (It was a long day for Tech, especially for the offensive line and Bradshaw, sacked 12 times by East Tennessee State. Butch, for one, played, although he was needing surgery on an injured knee.)
      Plans for us to talk about this prospective blog piece did not develop after that, as he again met physical challenges. But with his family's permission, here is the tribute to Our Man in Minden.
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      A recap of his sports career: 
      -- He was a starting linebacker and end as a junior on Minden's talented, unbeaten Class AA state championship football team in 1963; he was the best player as a senior on the '64 team. 
     -- He was a good and versatile baseball player. He became an all-conference offensive tackle at Louisiana Tech.
     -- He was a dedicated, hard-working football assistant coach for a decade at Minden High. 
     -- More significantly, he was a state championship-winning coach in baseball (1972) and, for a couple of decades, spent summers coaching Minden's American Legion baseball team; twice his team made the North Louisiana finals.
     -- As principal at Sibley High (10 miles south of Minden), he helped start the football program.
      How good an athlete was he? In researching for this piece, we came across these highlights:
      -- In the spring of 1964, the eventual Class AA state champion Jesuit (Shreveport) baseball team beat Minden 7-0 as super pitcher George Restovich gave up one hit. Butch got that hit.
      -- He was the placekicker for Minden in 1963 and 1964. The '63 team eased to most of its victories, but in 1964, Butch's PAT delivered a 7-6 victory against Airline (Bossier City), a first-year school. His PAT late in the game saved a 20-20 tie for Minden in a bitter rivalry game with Jesuit.

       (About that game: Jesuit's sensational junior running back Tony Papa was badly injured early that night when a Minden player hit him from behind long after Papa had handed off the ball on a trick kickoff return. Jesuit faithful always thought it was a "cheap-shot" hit -- that's what we heard -- and the Minden player who did it, they recalled, was Butch Williams. He swore to me it wasn't him ... but he knew who it was.)
      -- In his greatest '64 game, he scored 29 points in a 35-20 victory against Homer on four touchdowns (two short runs, a 42-yard pass reception, a 52-yard run with a fumble).
      -- Against North Caddo in '64, he intercepted a pass and ran it back 60 yards for a touchdown on the last play of the first half. Minden went on to win 41-18.
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      Butch, as like many of us, was a great admirer of Louisiana Tech's legendary head football coach-athletic director Joe Aillet, and he recalled these moments:
      As an eager freshman linebacker during a controlled scrimmage in the fall of 1965, Butch made the mistake of tackling QB Billy Laird, who that fall would be all-conference for the third year in a row. Coach Aillet -- soft-spoken, polished and polite, a professor-type coaching football -- rushed up (he was past age 60) and practically yelled, "No, no, no, we don't hit Billy."
      Another day, leaving the field after practice, Butch had his head down when Coach Aillet walked past. "He stopped me and asked, 'How are you doing, Wayne?' -- he always called me Wayne. I said, 'I don't know, Coach; I'm doing a lot of things wrong.' He said, 'Wayne, when we correct you, it means we think you have a chance to be a very good player. So keep at it.' "
      Two years later, Butch Williams was a regular in the Tech offensive line.
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      The highlight of Butch's coaching career, no question, was the 1972 Minden baseball season. It was one of the most dramatic, and surprising, events we covered in prep athletics.
      The 3-0 state-championship victory spoiled a perfect season for Bossier, a team that had gone 26-0, including three victories against district rival Minden. But junior pitcher Ronald Martin no-hit the Bearkats that day.
       It was Butch's second year as the Crimson Tide baseball coach and his team, tied for second in the district with Jesuit, had to be voted into the playoffs by a district committee.
        Reading back over the two stories we wrote that day, the funniest quote was Butch, finally greeting his pitcher after the title celebration and telling him, "You did a goooooood job."
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     More Williams family history: Wayne Sr. and Rene met in Dayton, Ohio, where he was stationed just after World War II when he was a captain in the US. Army Air Corps. By 1947, when Butch was born in Haynesville, La., his dad was principal at Shongaloo High School. He also had coached there.
     After the family's move to Minden in 1950, he became principal at Minden High, from 1952 to 1961, took a supervisor's position and then became superintendent. In honor of his 44 years of service, the Minden High football stadium -- "The Pit" -- was named for him in 2009.
     When Mama Rene retired from Minden High in May 1986, the city honored her with a "day." 
      The Williams family influence in Minden and the parish extended into business. For 4 1/2 decades, Butch and Ki  have owned Minden Athletic Supply in the old downtown, and younger brother Jimmy Williams helped manage it. Even Wayne Sr. worked there after his retirement from the education field.

      Butch's career took him from coaching and teaching biology and chemistry at Minden High to assistant principal there, then moving to Sibley as principal and staying on when that school consolidated with several others in the area to become Lakeside High.
       After 21 years as principal, in June 2003, he moved to his father's old job -- superintendent of Webster schools.
       Two contracts extensions followed. So did financial challenges in the schools and a controversial plan to consolidate several parish high school/middle schools.
       The superintendent has to make tough decisions and needs school-board support. It was waning. And so if Butch was beloved by most people in parish schools, he also has to take the heat. And he did ... until his surprise announcement on March 7, 2011, that he was ending his 38-year career in education.
       "I have had about all of this fun I can stand," he said at that school board meeting, then took his accrued vacation/sick time ... and left the building.
       He did consulting work in area schools for a short while, and took the time with Ki, the kids, grandkids, Tech athletics, Facebook, his garden and his friends.
       And, unfortunately, with many doctors, nurses in hospitals and clinics. Cancer is a brutal opponent.
       The last couple of times we talked -- his voice obviously weakened -- or traded messages, he told me how blessed his life had been, how grateful he was for friends and especially Ki and his family.
       The old offensive tackle is still battling, trying to block cancer. Our friend Wayne Williams Jr. -- Butch -- never backed down. He has done a goooooood job. 

Butch and his three sons

The grandfather always was a gamer.