Frank Williams

Williams at the launch of the FW15C in 1993

**Francis "Frank" Owen Garbett Williams** (born 16 April 1942 in South Shields, England) is the founder and team principal of Williams Grand Prix Engineering, better known simply as Williams.

## Early life

On 16 April 1942, Williams was born in South Shields, County Durham. At the time, his father served as an active RAF officer, while his mother worked as a school teacher. Williams was partly raised by his aunt and uncle in Jarrow, after the breakdown of his parents' marriage.

He subsequently spent much of his later childhood at a private boarding school, St Joseph's College, Dumfries, Scotland. In the late 1950s, a friend gave Williams a ride in his Jaguar XK150, which immediately served to catalyse his interest in fast cars.

## Motorsports career

After a brief career as a driver and mechanic, Williams founded Frank Williams Racing Cars in 1966, funded by his work as a travelling grocery salesman. He ran drivers, including Piers Courage, for several years in Formula Two and Formula Three. Williams purchased a Brabham Formula One chassis, which Courage drove throughout the 1969 Formula One season, twice finishing in second place.

In 1970, Williams undertook a brief partnership with Alejandro de Tomaso. After the death of Courage at the that year's Dutch Grand Prix, Williams's relationship with de Tomaso ended. In 1971, he raced Henri Pescarolo with a chassis purchased from March Engineering; 1972 saw the first F1 car built by the Williams works, the Politoys FX3 designed by Len Bailey. Pescarolo crashed and destroyed it at its first race.

Williams, short on cash and conducting team business from a telephone box after being disconnected for unpaid bills, looked to Marlboro and ISO Rivolta, an Italian car company, for sponsorship. Though they pledged their support, they did not come through in time. In 1976, Williams took on a partner in Canadian oil magnate Walter Wolf. Though the team continued functioning, it no longer belonged to Williams. He left in 1977, along with one of his employees, engineer Patrick Head. The two partners acquired an empty carpet warehouse in Didcot, Oxfordshire, and announced the formation of Williams Grand Prix Engineering, a new team to compete in Formula One. Frank hired Neil Oatley, a graduate at the time, to operate as a cartographer for Patrick Head's drawings. Later, he brought in Frank Dernie, formerly of Hesketh Racing, who added additional knowledge with suspension geometry, aerodynamics and the ability to write his own computer programmes (an extremely rare skill at the time).

The team's first win came when Clay Regazzoni drove the Cosworth-powered Williams FW07 to victory at the 1979 British Grand Prix at Silverstone. Their first Drivers' Championship and Constructors' Championship both came in 1980, with the Australian Alan Jones winning the drivers' title.

## Personal life

Williams met Virginia "Ginny" Berry in 1967. They married in 1974. They have two sons, Jonathan Piers (b. 1975) and Jaime Francis (b. 1982), and a daughter, Claire (b. 1976).

Williams has used a wheelchair since a car accident in the South of France, on 8 March 1986, rendered him tetraplegic. He was driving with team sponsorship manager Peter Windsor in a hired Ford Sierra from the Circuit Paul Ricard to Nice Côte d'Azur Airport when the incident happened. Williams had been at the circuit to watch the testing of the team's new Williams FW11, but as a keen long-distance runner, he was returning to the airport following the trials because he wished to compete in a half marathon in London the next day.

During the drive to the airport, he lost control of the hire car on a slight left-hand kink in the road, clipping a low stone wall, causing the vehicle to leave the highway. An eight-foot (2.4 m) drop between the road and a field caused the car to roll onto the driver's side. Williams remained conscious but was immediately aware that he could not move and feared fire due to fuel spillage. After being pressed between his seat and the crushed roof, he suffered a spinal fracture between the fourth and fifth vertebra. Windsor, who had sustained only minor injuries, extracted Williams from the vehicle while waiting for the emergency services. Virginia flew with Patrick Head to the French hospital and believed that Williams was about to die. She organised his urgent repatriation to England, where doctors at Royal London Hospital performed a tracheotomy, which then allowed his lungs to be drained of fluid, almost certainly saving his life. Williams requires constant care and physical dependence on others as a consequence of the accident.

## Notes

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Taylor, Simon (May 2015). "Lunch with... Sir Frank Williams". *Motor Sport*. **91** (5): 73–78. Archived from the original on 16 April 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
2. ↑ Williams, Richards (28 November 2021). Sir Frank Williams obituary.
3. ↑ Baird, Roger (20 September 2012). Sir Frank Williams: Back in the hunt.
4. ↑ Lewin, Andrew (28 November 2021). Sir Frank Williams – A life at the heart of Formula 1.
5. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>"The Knight with dirty fingernails". *The Northern Echo*. 24 May 2001. Archived from the original on 29 November 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Matt Jeffery, Formula 1 Chronicles: Frank Williams Archived 2 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Highandbye.com, 21 June 2012
7. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Henry, A. (1991). *Williams: The Business of Grand Prix Racing*. Somerset: Patrick Stephens. p. 33. ISBN 1-85260-434-4.
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 People: Sir Frank Williams. Inside F1 Inc.
9. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Roebuck, Nigel (2 July 2012). "Grand Prix Gold: 1979 British GP". *Autosport*. Archived from the original on 28 November 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
10. ↑ Ginny Williams 1946 – 2013. Joe Saward (8 March 2013).
11. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Baird, Roger (11 April 2013). "Williams' daughter takes the driving seat". *Financial Times*. Archived from the original on 24 May 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
12. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Aitken, Jonathan (2006). *Heroes and Contemporaries*. London, England: Continuum. p. 184. ISBN 0-8264-7833-6. Archived from the original on 29 November 2021. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
13. ↑ Williams: Incredible True Story of Formula One's Greatest Family. Spinal Injuries Association (12 July 2017).
14. ↑ Fagnan, René (8 March 2021). 8 Mars : Frank Williams Devient Tétraplégique Après Un Grave Accident En 1986 (fr).
15. ↑ <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Thomas, Tony (6 March 1986). ""I Was Nuts About Racing And There I Was, in My Twenties, Right in The Thick of It"" (PDF). *Auto* (10): 52. Archived (PDF) from the original on 26 October 2020. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 <templatestyles src="Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css"></templatestyles>Coe, Sebastian (11 March 2001). "Running fan Williams is still on pace". *The Daily Telegraph*. Archived from the original on 28 February 2016. Retrieved 28 November 2021.
17. ↑ Formula One team owner Frank Williams. *East Valley Tribune* (7 October 2011).
18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 Catch up tv? Watch On Demand tv programs via Your iPlayer free.