Archie Williams
American sprinter and mathematics teacher (1915–1993)
Archie Franklin Williams (May 1, 1915 – June 24, 1993) was an American U.S. Air Force officer, athlete, and teacher. He was the winner of the 400 meter run at the 1936 Summer Olympics.
Biography
Archie Williams was born in Oakland, California, to a family that was active in promoting Black civil rights. He attended University High School in Oakland, then San Mateo Junior College (now College of San Mateo). His coach, Dr. Oliver Byrd, was instrumental in preparing him for future achievements. Soon Williams transferred to the University of California, Berkeley, to become a mechanical engineer and he continued to run track.
Until 1936, Williams had never broken 49 seconds for the 440 yd (402 m). During 1936, however, Williams kept lowering his times and reached his peak at the NCAA championships, setting a world record in 400m of 46.1. His time was set in the preliminaries, and he also prevailed in the final for a 47.0 victory.
The public source identifies “Archie Williams” as american sprinter and mathematics teacher (1915–1993). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Archie, Williams and American.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q634091. VIAF identifies the subject as 460144783097209830221. The Library of Congress control number is no2015145938. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1915, 1993 and 1936.
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This entry incorporates text from “Archie Williams” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.