On several occasions, I have used this column space to compose obituaries, and the passing of Dr. William G. Anderson gives me reason for a special dedication.
In 1961, after white men attacked Black women at Albany State College in Georgia, the local NAACP Youth Council staged a rally protesting the attacks. When dissension arose between leaders of the NAACP and SNCC about how to combat racism and discrimination in the city, Dr. Anderson, an osteopath and owner of a drugstore, was elected to head a new formation to resolve the differing views. In my book, “We Shall Overcome – The History of the Civil Rights Movement as it Happened,” I wrote that Dr. Anderson, a native of Americus, Ga., had come to Albany to begin his practice with no intention of getting involved in the Civil Rights Movement.
“That was not in my long range plans,” he said. However, after being segregated twice, he was ready to join the fight. “First I was segregated because I was Black and second because I was a DO (doctor of osteopathy).”
Many community leaders felt that because he was a doctor, he would be the best mediator to allay the heated differences. Later, when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Rev. Ralph Abernathy arrived in town (whom Dr. Anderson, in fact, summoned), he would join them at rallies and demonstrations.
Leading those marches was his introduction to the movement and only the beginning for an activist career that extended over the course of his 98 years. He died on August 16 at his home in Detroit. I had no idea he lived in my hometown and had been living there since 1962, after the Albany movement ended. He became the first African American surgical resident and later opened a surgical practice.
Along with his medical practice, he also taught at the Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine. In 1994, he became the first Black president of the American Osteopathic Association.
In his memoir, “The Making of a (Pardoned) Felon During the Civil Rights Movement in America: The Physician Who Helped Heal American Democracy,” Dr. Anderson proudly claimed the conviction he received in Albany.
It was a dubious distinction, he said, but he always saw that as a hallmark of his illustrious life.
