Williams family papers

Arthur V. Williams Sr. (1878-1951) was born in Camden, South Carolina, to Jacob M. and Pauline G. Williams. After his father's death, he began working at an early age to help support his mother and nine siblings. In 1918, he married Zerline Levy (1898-1999) and the couple had two children, Betty and Arthur V. Williams Jr. Throughout his life he was a member of Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim, in Charleston, South Carolina, serving as secretary and treasurer from 1916 until 1936, when he resigned from that position and became president of the congregation. Arthur was also involved in several local Jewish organizations, including the Hebrew Benevolent Society, for which he served as president, the Hebrew Orphan Society, B'nai B'rith Lodge No. 593, for which he also served as president, the Jewish Welfare Board, and the Anti-Defamation League. Alongside his wife Zerline, he worked as the district manager of the New England Mutual Life Insurance Company of Boston, Massachusetts, for 35 years, until his death in 1951. Zerline went on to work as a life insurance agent with the New Jersey-based Mutual Benefit Life Insurance Company for 15 more years before retiring.

Arthur V. Williams Jr. (1919-2007), was born to Arthur and Zerline Levy Williams in Charleston, South Carolina. After graduating from Charleston High School, he attended Clemson University from 1936 to 1940 and went on to graduate from the Medical College of South Carolina (now the Medical University of South Carolina) in 1943. He served in the United States Army as an internist from 1945 to 1947, during which time he met Mary Jane Mendelsohn, whom he married in 1946. After his service in the army, the couple moved to Milwaukee, where Arthur completed his residency at Marquette University School of Medicine, assisting in the design of the Kolff-type artificial kidney.

He then returned to Charleston to practice internal medicine, making significant advances in the field of nephrology. In 1955, he became one of the first American nephrologists to dialyze a human being. In 1966, he joined the faculty at MUSC to head the Hemodialysis Unit, establishing the first dialysis program in South Carolina and founding the MUSC Division of Nephrology, which he served as director from 1970 to 1984. In addition to writing a textbook on nephrology, he published two memoirs, Tales of Charleston 1930s, in 1999, and Tales of Clemson 1936-1940, in 2002.

Betty Williams Gendelman (1921-2007) was born in Charleston, South Carolina, to Zerline Levy and Arthur Williams. She married Sam Gendelman and the couple had three children: Arthur, Barry, and Paul.