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Since the last installment of Go Tech Go, Virginia Tech athletics experienced a great loss when Jack Williams died on May 26, 2015, at the age of 85. A true original, Jack served as the Hokies’ lead sports publicist from 1978 to 1999, and anybody who met him would never forget him. He favored gray suits, blue oxford-cloth shirts, and rarely was seen without a tie. I don’t know if I ever saw him in any suit other than gray. He loved a Budweiser nightcap and a roast beef sandwich to go. He was dedicated to his job and took it seriously. He was passionate, intense, and yes, he had a temper. He could yell at you, but then it would blow over, and that was it. It never came up again. He was such an idiosyncratic individual, unique, with a legendary persona; how could you not love him?

He was a Carolina alumnus, but he loved Virginia Tech. Lived and died with each win and loss. Passionate, caring, intense. Full of life. A day for Jack Williams was not one where you simply went through the motions. No. You hit things headfirst, and yes, if you knocked some people down in the process, well, then you picked them up and dusted them off and moved on.

A former newspaperman who spent 19 years in newspapers at the Durham Morning Herald, Atlanta Constitution and Raleigh News & Observer, Williams joined his alma mater, UNC, as sports information director in 1966, when Dean Smith was the basketball coach and Bill Dooley was the football coach. In Chapel Hill he created the Carolina Blue Book, a more colorful, informative magazine-style media guide than the bare-bones brochures in vogue at the time.

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