Terence Dean Williams of Gloucester, passed away Oct. 29, 2019 at his family home in Keswick after a long, quiet and courageous struggle with pancreatic cancer. At his side were his beloved wife of 54 years, Cam, and his trusted business partner of more than 30 years, Diane L. Johnson. 

Mr. Williams was a financial professional with more than half a century of investment experience at the highest levels. He was a graduate of Furman University and of the University of Virginia’s Darden Graduate School of Business Administration. He managed global equity portfolios and mutual funds for some of the world’s largest corporations and financial institutions. He reported on investment policy to the governing boards of dozens of domestic and foreign corporations, endowments and foundations and to several governments and central banks. During his long career he was a student, soldier, intelligence officer, research analyst, investor, university trustee, and director of domestic and foreign corporations. He did work-related postgraduate study at Stanford University, Oxford University and the London Business School. Mr. Williams was the son of a career Marine. After earning an M.B.A., he trained as a combat platoon leader at the U.S. Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, where he graduated first in his platoon. He was reassigned to the Army’s Intelligence branch for specialized training and served one year in Vietnam as a reconnaissance officer. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the Vietnam Cross of Gallantry with Silver Star. His unit, the 1st Military Intelligence Battalion, was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation and the U.S. Army’s Distinguished Unit Citation.

He began his business career as a security analyst in the investment division of Morgan Guaranty Trust Company of New York, at that time the world’s largest manager of fiduciary assets. He was later appointed a member of its stock selection committee and manager of its largest equity fund. Among the many corporations which he served as lead pension portfolio manager during these years were The Ford Motor Company, Caterpillar, Texas Instruments, International Paper, Texaco, and Johnson & Johnson. In 1980, Mr. Williams joined index fund pioneer and computer-driven investment manager Batterymarch Financial Management in Boston as Senior Vice President and later as Trustee. He managed the firm’s international equity portfolio, Vanguard Trustees’ Commingled Fund International, and created and managed two mutual funds whose shareholders were exclusively large Japanese financial institutions. Among the organizations which he also served directly as lead portfolio manager during this period were AT&T, General Motors, The State of Oregon, Cargill, Inc., The Coca-Cola Company, The Ford Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Memorial Sloan-Kettering Foundation, and the monetary authority of a Middle East oil-producing nation. In 1988, Mr. Williams was elected a partner of Philadelphia-based investment firm Miller, Anderson and Sherrerd, later acquired in 1996 by Morgan Stanley. He originated the firm’s international equity investment business and was appointed a member of its Executive Committee. He was the firm’s representative to its Asian part-owner, a large Japanese bank. Among the organizations which he also served directly as lead portfolio manager during this period were The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, The State of Alaska, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Texas Instruments, The Carnegie Endowment, and The Smithsonian Institution. 

Among Mr. Williams’ past professional responsibilities and affiliations were: Member of the Board of Governors of the Association for Investment Management and Research (AIMR) and Chair of its Audit Committee; Member of the Board of Governors of the Financial Analysts Federation; Member of the Board of Governors of the International Society of Financial Analysts; and Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Financial Analysts Seminar. He had addressed the annual Financial Analysts Seminar as its keynote speaker. His remarks, “Trying Too Hard,” were republished in the Financial Analysts Journal. He was the first non-Japanese person invited to address the Security Analysts’ Association of Japan as its keynote speaker. Mr. Williams was elected to the board of Ministers & Missionaries, an endowment for the benefit of retired Baptist ministers and missionaries, made possible by funding in 1911 from John D. Rockefeller Sr. He was appointed a member of the board’s Finance Committee and attended monthly meetings in New York in that capacity for 24 years. He served as guest lecturer and Advisory Board member for Stanford Business School’s Investment Management Program, then co-chaired by Professors John McDonald and William Sharpe, who was later awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics. Mr. Williams was invited to join the Advisory Council of Furman University and served five terms, most recently as its Chairman. In 1989, he was elected a Member of the Board of Trustees of the Landmark group of mutual funds, later known as Citifunds, a subsidiary of Citicorp. In 1994 he was elected a member of the Board of Directors of Dazhong Transportation Company, a publicly-traded Chinese company listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. He became the first non-Asian elected to such a position in China. In 1996 he was elected a Trustee of Furman University, where he served on the Athletics Committee and as Chair of its Finance Committee. Since 1997, Mr. Williams has been an independent private investor in partnership with Diane L. Johnson, his longtime research partner. Anyone who knew Dean well understood that his respect and enthusiasm for the University of Virginia sports program and its coaches was unmatched. He was a committed Cavalier fan.

In 2012, Dean and his wife Cam formed a family foundation in their names and have continued, through it, to support the same causes of animal welfare and individual, academic and religious freedom that have always attracted them. Their foundation’s primary local beneficiary has been the Gloucester-Mathews Humane Society.

Should friends desire, memorial contributions may be made to the Gloucester-Mathews Humane Society, P.O. Box 385, Gloucester, Va. 23061 or the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society, 875 N. Randolph St., Suite 225, Arlington, Va. 22203.

A memorial service conducted by the Rev. Dr. Doug Nagel will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 9, 2019, at Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church, 6740 Main Street, Gloucester, Va. 23061. Services under the direction of Hogg Funeral Home.