Roger Williams

Biography

Roger Williams was a man of many careers, one of which was portraying heavies in a hundred plus B westerns, serials and a other features during the years 1933 - 1939. At Republic Pictures, he did westerns with the Three Mesquiteers, Roy Rogers, and Gene Autry. But his usual employers were Poverty Row production companies churning out westerns starring Fred Scott, Tom Tyler, Jack Perrin, Kermit Maynard, Harry Carey, Bob Custer, Rex Bell, Rex Lease, Reb Russell, others. Roger Grimes Williams was born in Denver, Colorado on February 8, 1898 to Charles H. Williams and Eva / Evangeline Lloyd. Circa 1910, the family had re-located to Los Angeles. He served in the Army during World War I, became a Second Lieutenant in the Field Artillery, and served from June 23, 1917 - January 8, 1919. Before and after his brief time in Hollywood, Williams had many jobs. In the census and other records, he was a "Paper Maker", "General utility - Iron works", "Ox Welder", "Mechanic", "Designer - Ornamental Iron", "Stage Manager", and "Engineer" for Douglas Aircraft, McDonnell Aircraft and Northrop Aircraft. Appears he also did four years of college, probably after his World War I military service. Circa 1939 - 1940, Williams exited the movie business and began work in the airplane industry. In the 1940 census, he's with Douglas Aircraft in California and when he registered for the World War II draft in late 1942, he was in St. Louis, Missouri and employed by McDonnell Aircraft ... and he still had the "acting bug". Several articles in the August, 1943 editions of the St. Louis Star-Times newspaper highlight a play to be performed by McDonnell Aircraft's in-house MAC Players dramatic group. The director was Roger Williams, aeronautical engineer at McDonnell Aircraft and one-time actor at Republic Pictures. Circa late 1940s, Roger and family returned to California and he was employed as an engineer with Northrop Aircraft Corporation. Roger was married three times. His first was to (purported) actress Vera Paloma Bennett in 1916 and that ended in a 1919 divorce. Marriage number two was in 1920 to Ruby Bell Noe in Utah and daughter Juanita was born in 1921. Ruby passed away from tuberculosis in December, 1922. Ellen was his third wife and they had two sons and a daughter: Dolores Evangeline was born in 1928; Roger Lincoln in 1930; and Arthur Francis in 1932. In their later years, Roger and Ellen resided in Paramount, Los Angeles County, California. He passed on December 18, 1964 at St. Helens Hospital, Bellflower, California and cause of death was arteriosclerotic heart disease. Roger and Ellen are interred at Westminster Memorial Park, Westminster, Orange County, California. Current biographies on Roger Williams are chock full of misinformation. He did not graduate from the Colorado School of Mines in Denver. And he was not the Roger Williams who died in 1939 at the Wildyrie Camp in the San Bernardino Mountains in California. That Roger Williams was born in 1889 in Dayton, Ohio, is interred in Dayton, and was an auditor for the Los Angeles Biltmore hotel.