http://www.fayobserver.com/articles/2011/08/22/1115999
But Williams has the kind of life story that makes the wait worthwhile.
Williams, well-known as the basketball coach at the University of North Carolina, will share the lesser-known story of his hardscrabble childhood on Sept. 8 at a luncheon at Snyder Memorial Baptist Church.
"We had a whole list of people, but we kept coming back to him,'' said Giving Circle member Alisa Debnam, who is helping to organize the event. "The fact that he was raised by his mother, the values she instilled in him and the great things he's done to help others are what the Women's Giving Circle is all about.''
The event, called the Power of the Purse, is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Tickets are $75 per person and proceeds go to help the Women's Giving Circle fund programs that benefit women and children.
The women in the circle - more than 130 now - have awarded $125,340 over the past three years to Cumberland County nonprofit organizations that benefit women and children, including $25,000 awarded in June to Fayetteville Area Operation Inasmuch. That money will go to renovate a home for homeless women.
The Giving Circle's causes are the kind that are certain to have struck a chord with Roy Williams. After his alcoholic father abandoned the family, he was raised by a resilient, gentle-natured mother who worked hard to support her two children.
"Family was all that mattered to my mother,'' Williams wrote in his 2009 book, "Hard Work: A Life On and Off the Court.'' "Family was her first priority and second, third, fourth and fifth. Nothing ever got in the way of that.''
Williams recalls the days when he and his friends would stop by a service station on the way home from school. The station had a vending machine that sold Coca-Colas for 10 cents.
"Now my mom knew I loved nothing better than a cold Coca-Cola,'' Williams writes. "But she also knew I didn't have the money to buy one.''
He told his mother that the station had a nice water fountain and that he settled for that while his friends bought their sodas.
The next morning, and most mornings after, his mother left a dime for him on the kitchen table.
The days of watching his family struggle have long passed, but Williams has never forgotten. He and his wife, Wanda, have contributed $200,000 to the Carolina Covenant, an initiative at North Carolina that allows low-income students to attend the university without incurring debt, and the two serve as honorary co-chairs of a $10 million campaign to endow the program.
Giving Circle member Amy Perko, a former Academic All-American and all-Atlantic Coast Conference player at Wake Forest, got to know Williams when he was the basketball coach at Kansas and she was an associate athletic director at the school.
"He's good about carving out time on his schedule to help causes that help others,'' Perko said. "Coach Williams has an inspiring story. His is a story that transcends which team you pull for in March.''
Community news editor Kim Hasty can be reached at hastyk@fayobserver.com or 486-3591.
