Woodrow “Woody” Williams, 80, of Baltimore, Maryland, passed away Sunday, January 29, 2023, at home surrounded by his family after a long battle with metastatic renal cell carcinoma. Born in Philadelphia, he was the son of Woodrow Williams Sr., a police officer in Glassboro, New Jersey, and Evelyn Woodland, a longtime employee of the Bell Telephone Company in Philadelphia. He was raised by his grandparents, Edward and Estelle Woodland, in Glassboro.

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Woody was a 1960 graduate of Glassboro Senior High School and came to Baltimore to attend what was then Morgan State College, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in physical education. While at Morgan, with a group of fourteen daring, young, black American men who wanted to change the way we think about brotherhood, Groove Phi Groove Social Fellowship, was founded in 1962.

 

The Fellowship continues to play an important role in developing and nurturing what we know as Black America, promoting academic awareness, ethical standards, and unity among men in undergraduate and graduate college programs; creating intelligent and effective leadership; and studying and helping to alleviate the social and economic problems of society to generally improve the world.

 

A four-year member and captain of Morgan State’s swim team, he was inducted into the school’s Athletic Hall of Fame in 1974. He also served in the National Army Medical Corps Reserve.

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In 1965, Mr. Williams taught physical education at Edmondson-Westside High School and married his college sweetheart, Beverly Elizabeth Brown, in 1966, at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in Baltimore. They were married for 56 years and have one daughter, Dr. Lanaya Williams Smith of Baltimore. He moved on to teach and coach at Lake Clifton High School when it opened in 1971.

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As a family man, educator, and head coach of the powerhouse Lake Clifton High School boys’ basketball teams in the 1970s and 1980s, Woodrow “Woody” Williams savored the opportunity to have an impact on the lives around him. He coached various sports including basketball, football, swimming, and track and field, and served as athletic director at Lake Clifton and later at Mergenthaler Vocational Technical High School before retiring in 2004.

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His most profound coaching success came with the Lake Clifton boys basketball program when, from 1971 to 1987, he guided the Lakers to a 278-93 record. In consecutive seasons in 1975 and ’76, the Lakers went 46-4 with Maryland Scholastic Association A Conference and Baltimore City crowns. In the 1986-87 season, the Lakers went 26-1 with a sweep of both titles. He did so with a tone that was mostly mild-mannered but stern when necessary.

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In addition to his wife and daughter, Mr. Williams is survived by his sister, Mrs. Faith Baxter of Virginia Beach, Virginia; a granddaughter, Madison Beverly Smith of Baltimore; a grandson, Austin Woodrow Smith of Baltimore; and nieces and nephews.