![](https://cdispatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Slim-Smith-by-Birney-6-150x150.jpg)
I was not aware of the passing of David Allen Williams until I saw his obituary in the weekend edition of The Dispatch. Certainly, I was saddened to hear the news, but I could not help but smile as I remembered our long-ago association.
I spent more than half of my 44-years career in the newspaper business working in the sports department. In fact, even before my first full-time job in newspapers, I had been writing sports as a freelancer (they were called stringers) since 1978 when I was a student at Mississippi State. My association with The Dispatch started then and in that capacity. I was mostly confined to covering high school football, including one memorable scoreless time between Starkville and Amory to which I devoted 44 column inches (roughly 1,500 words). It was thought to be a world record by David Putnam, the much-chagrined Dispatch sports editor. “Thank God nobody scored,” he grumbled before he began slashing long tedious sections of my game story. “You would have written a novel.”
In addition to high school sports, I also got to cover Mississippi State and Alabama football games, but only if the opponents were terrible. Suffice to say, I covered a lot of Alabama home games against Vanderbilt and MSU home games against North Texas, Marshall and Louisiana Tech.
Quite often, I would be joined at those games by Williams, whose official association with The Dispatch I found ambiguous. I knew he wasn’t one of the several staff photographers, but I saw him in The Dispatch office often where he developed the film on the game photos he had taken. D.A. loved sports and photography, so I’m not sure all of his work (or even the majority of it) was on a paying basis.
There was one sporting event that D.A. loved most of all – Talladega 500, which he photographed each year. Not being much of a racing fan, his race photos printed in The Dispatch didn’t impress me much.
It was his unpublished photos from the sprawling Talladega infield, a great gathering of Gomorrah, that grabbed my attention. Over the years, D.A. had assembled a large portfolio of these Talladega infield photos, which he kept in a thick binder and shared only with those he believed could keep their mouths shut.
At the time, D.A. was in his mid-30s and I was approaching 20 and was someone he judged could discreetly appreciate this particular photographic genre.
When the coast was clear, he’d pull out the binder and show me his latest work – photo after photo of topless young women, all beaming as they lifted their T-shirts for their, uh, close-up. I was not then what you would call a worldly young man, so I was amazed not only by the photos themselves, but how D.A. had managed to get those shots. He insisted they were all spontaneous and that, as a photographer, he was simply recording a piece of NASCAR folk culture for posterity, if not for publication.
I had my doubts about this. From my limited experience, getting to see that part of the female anatomy required much begging and many promises made over many dates. You might even have to go steady to get that kind of view.
Of course, this was before I went to New Orleans for Mardis Gras or, 20 years later, the infield at Kentucky Derby, places where debauched masses made for an “anything goes, especially clothes” atmosphere.
Decades later, after my career had taken me from Columbus to Biloxi to San Francisco to Phoenix and back to Columbus, I was surprised and delighted to see D.A. in the press box at Davis Wade Stadium one Saturday, still taking photos.
He had been doing this for probably years by then, mostly for fun since he made his career as a pharmacist.
That was about 12 years ago. I don’t know how much longer he kept shooting.
I also don’t know if he was still covering – or perhaps, better put, uncovering – the Talladega 500, but a part of me hopes he kept making that trek and taking those photos right up until the end.
It makes me smile.
D.A. was a friendly, fun-loving guy. I’m sure glad our paths crossed.
As for what will become of his Talladega portfolio, if they still exist, I don’t know. He is survived by two daughters, so I don’t know if they would have a full appreciation of them.
But if nobody else has claimed it, I’d be happy to give them a home in memory of my early days in the business and my photographer pal, D.A. Williams.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 38 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.