Stephen James Williams was born in Corbin, KY on November 8, 1944. He spent the last part of his life in Tennessee, the Volunteer State, and certainly lived up to that name. Basing his life on voluntary service to others, he helped raise three generations of his family.
Steve showed his traits of leadership and service at an early age. He was the quarterback of his high school football team and enlisted in the Army in the early 1960s to serve his country. He went to basic training at Fort Sill, OK and to the New Mexico Military Institute as preparation for entering West Point.
His Howitzer entry attests to his work ethic. Maintaining his standing in the upper half of the class through late night studying, his roommates chided him for staying up past midnight. Of course, getting up the next morning required urging from those same roommates.
Steve worked at KDET, the cadet radio station. During his last three years, he actively participated in the Fine Arts Forum, ultimately serving as publicity chairman.
Most notably, Steve looked for ways to help others. Fred Dibella tells of the time he had to make a short-notice trip to Washington, DC and had no time to make return arrangements. Steve overheard the situation and met Fred at LaGuardia, unannounced, and drove him back to West Point. “That was Steve,” said Fred. “Clear-eyed, pure-heart, rock-jaw friend.”
Other companymates experienced that same sense of selfless volunteerism. A snowstorm stranded the car of a classmate’s girlfriend outside the Superintendent’s house, near G-4’s barracks in the Lost Fifties. Along with classmates John French and John Suermann, Steve pitched in to shovel snow. Together, they pushed the car enough to allow it to gain traction and return safely to the Thayer Hotel.
Through the match-making efforts of the cadet hostess, three Cassidy sisters (Jo-Ann and twins Connie and Lorrie) were paired with cadets from three different classes. Steve found his soulmate, Connie, early in his cadet career and dated her throughout his last two-and-a-half years at West Point. After completing her nursing program at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, DC, Connie moved to Highland Falls, NY. Despite having 3,600 hours of clinical practice experience, she scrimped by on a low-paying job at the West Point Hospital awaiting her State Board Certification. Her salary of 11 dollars a day, paired with a meager cadet allowance, didn’t allow much for the couple, but Connie was close to Steve.
A year before Steve’s graduation, Jo-Ann married a member of the Class of ’68. On Graduation Day 1969, the twins had a highly publicized double wedding, complete with cadets raising the arch of sabers as the two couples exited the service. Lorrie wed Robert Keenan Jr., Class of ’67, and Connie married Steve. Their reception was at the NCO Club with flowers on the table reportedly coming from the Superintendent’s garden.
As a newly commissioned second lieutenant of Field Artillery, Steve completed the initial rounds of junior officer training before reporting to Tacoma, WA. When orders to Vietnam were canceled, Steve attended flight school. They moved to Mineral Wells, TX, then Enterprise, AL, where Connie learned the protocols of an Army wife.
When Steve was deployed to Korea for a one-year unaccompanied tour, Connie followed another aviator’s wife to White Hall, PA and continued raising their two infant sons.
Following Korea, Steve answered the call of the cannons and returned to Oklahoma. He was assigned to the Field Artillery School, where he helped write the Soldier’s Manual. While there, he earned an MBA from the University of Oklahoma. Together with his classmate, the “other Steve Williams,” he met the flying hour minimums in hopes of continuing an aviation career.
A non-flying assignment to the 1/81st FA in Neu-Ulm, Germany, extinguished that dream. Steve subsequently became the deputy community commander at Schwäbisch Gmündt, before returning to FORSCOM HQ in Atlanta, GA. Then, while assigned to the 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley, KS, health issues forced a relocation back to better medical facilities in Atlanta. Steve found himself on the FORSCOM staff again, this time briefing General Colin Powell on the financial status of the command. While there, Steve also taught finance and accounting at Georgia Military College.
He retired as a lieutenant colonel in 1990 and moved to Bartlett, TN. Steve became a cost accountant at Kimberly Clark Corporation’s mill in Memphis. Later, he worked in commercial fleet sales for Ford.
But Steve was not ready to slow down, despite the couple’s numerous medical challenges. His entry in the Class of 1969 Legacy Book praises Connie for remaining tough through bouts of cancer, MS, and diabetes. He also notes that he has been “leaving body parts behind in every hospital,” citing the replacement of his hip and both knees and the removal of his gall bladder.
Undaunted, Steve mentored local girls’ basketball and soccer teams and was dubbed “Coach Grampa.” He and Connie remained active in their local Methodist Church, teaching accelerated reading and math. Together, they were recognized with the Shelby County “Friends of Education Award.”
The final path for Steve began when he suffered a heart attack in late February 2019. He died on March 13, following complications after by-pass surgery, ending nearly 50 years of marriage to his Connie. Together they raised two sons, Kenneth and Christopher. Steve was the loving grandfather of Brianna, Ashlyn and James, and great-grandfather of Kylie Ann.
Steve’s death prompted a precious question, one which only that four-year-old great-granddaughter could ask, “How far is heaven from our house?”
 — Stewart Bornhoft, classmate and companymate