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Richard Dove Williams Jr. came into the world on February 14, 1942. He was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. Richard moved to California after he graduated from high school and started a new life there.
Weddings and Children
Richard didn’t spend too much time in California before he met Betty Johnson. They got married in 1965. Before they broke up in 1973, Richard and Betty had five children together. Those children were Sabrina, Richard III, Ronner, Reluss, and Reneeka. After Richard and Betty broke up, Betty’s daughter from a previous relationship, Katrina, helped raise their other children.
Richard met Oracene Price, also known as “Brandy,” for the first time in 1979. Brandy is the mother of two girls. This is because she was married to a man before who died. The wedding of Brandy and Richard took place in 1980. Both Brandy and Richard worked in the field of medicine. Richard worked as a security guard, and Brandy was a nurse. After that, they were blessed with two little girls: Venus, who was born on June 17, 1980, and Serena, who came on September 26, 1981.
Brandy and Richard raised their kids in Compton, California, which was their home. In the end, in 2002, they broke up.
Next, Richard started dating a woman named Lakeisha Juanita Graham who owned a grocery store in the area. Since Venus was only one year older than Lakeisha, this made some people curious. Richard and Lakeisha got married in the year 2010. In 2012, they had a son. The following year, in 2017, they got a divorce.
Tennis
After Richard moved to Long Beach, California, he started flipping through channels and somehow ended up watching the 1978 French Open. Virginia Ruzici, a tennis player from Poland, won in the end and became the women’s singles champion. Even though Richard didn’t care much about the tennis tournament, he couldn’t help but notice that Ruzici won $40,000 for coming in first. Taking into account the effects of inflation, that amount is about the same as 170,000 dollars in today’s money.
At the same time, Richard decided that both Venus and Serena would become famous tennis players in the future. So that his daughters could become the best tennis players in the world, he even wrote an 85-page plan to help them get there.
In the 1980s, when his girls were still young, he started taking them to public tennis courts to teach them how to play. On occasion, they would drill from 6 a.m. until it got dark.
After Venus was born, the family picked up and moved from California to Brandy’s home town of Saginaw, Michigan. In 1981, they moved across the country again, this time to California. They chose to live in the rough neighbourhood of Compton.
In 1991, the family moved to Palm Beach, Florida, so that the girls could keep practising without having to worry about the dangers in Compton at the time. Rick Macci, a local coach in Florida, saw the girls play and knew they had a lot of potential. He started training them in a more professional way.
In 1994, when she was 14, Venus had her first job. The next year, Serena started working as a professional.
The two sisters had a memorable match at the Australian Open in 1998. It was their first big professional match. Serena was 16 and Venus was 17. Venus won in straight sets.
Serena Williams won the U.S. Open in 1999 when she was only 18 years old. Venus won Wimbledon in 2000, when she was 20 years old. When Venus won Wimbledon, Richard could be heard yelling “Straight out of Compton!” from the stands. This was a reference to the rap group NWA, which was also from Compton, and their song “Straight outta Compton.”
At this point, everyone knows that Venus and Serena Williams have been the best professional women’s tennis players for a long time and that they continue to win big tournaments regularly.
Even though he was their coach in the late 1990s and early 2000s, when he was very visible, they are now working with new coaches. Today, Richard can sometimes be seen in the stands clapping and cheering for them.
What Venus and Serena Williams have done
Venus and Serena have won a combined total of 30 Grand Slam singles titles and more than 120 other singles titles in their careers so far. As a team, they have won 22 doubles tournaments, 14 of which were Grand Slam tournaments.
The sisters have won more than 175 million dollars in tournaments. Off the court, sponsorship deals have made them hundreds of millions of dollars more.
Book
Richard wrote a book with another person called “Black and White: The Way I See It.” It came out in 2014.
When he’s not following his kids’ tennis careers, he spends his time taking pictures.
King Richard
In November 2021, Warner Bros. Pictures put out a movie about Richard called “King Richard.” This movie was based on Richard’s life. In the movie, Will Smith plays the part of the person.
Earnings
Richard Williams is a well-known tennis coach in the United States, and he is worth $10 million. Richard Williams is the father of both tennis stars Venus Williams and Serena Williams.
