Bernard Williams (radiologist)

This article is about the radiologist. For the chorister and chaplain, see Bernard Williams (choir director).

Bernard H. Williams (born c. 1930; died March 1992) was a pioneer in the Nuclear Medicine Technology Program in the UAB Department of Radiology, and a founding member of the Alabama Society of Nuclear Medicine.

Williams graduated from Parker High School and earned a bachelor's degree at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia and a graduate degree in medical technology at Maharry Medical School in Nashville, Tennessee in 1954. He served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps during the Korean War, and then returned to Birmingham and applied to work at the Birmingham VA Medical Center.

Despite his credentials, Williams was assigned a job as a technician in the hospital's animal laboratory. He married the former Nadean Saffold, a music teacher, in 1958 and spent time studying endocrinology at Memorial Hospital in New York City in 1959.

James Pittman befriended him and became a mentor, encouraging his promotion to Radiation Safety Officer, and later bringing him to the University of Alabama School of Medicine. He joined the faculty in 1966 as one of the only African Americans at the university.

Williams left UAB for training at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.

References

• "Birmingham Chemist and Wife Cited as Happy Career Couple" (December 16, 1961) The Pittsburgh Courier