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Sir Francis Drake High School gets new, familiar name in racial reckoning

The outline of the name Sir Francis Drake remains on the front of Sir Francis Drake High School after workers removed the name on July 29, 2020 in San Anselmo, California.
The outline of the name Sir Francis Drake remains on the front of Sir Francis Drake High School after workers removed the name on July 29, 2020 in San Anselmo, California.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

The name of Sir Francis Drake High School in San Anselmo will be changed.

This one will be a familiar name to those connected with the school.


School district officials voted on Tuesday night to change the name from Sir Francis Drake High School to Archie Williams High School.

Williams won a Gold Medal at the 1936 Olympic games in the 400-meter run, graduated from UC Berkeley, joined the Tuskegee Airmen during World War II, was one of the first black meteorologists, and taught high school math and computers at Drake for 21 years from the late 1960s to the late 1980s.

He retired at the age of 72.

Community members had been campaigning for some time to have Williams recognized on campus. The campaign took on new urgency during last summer’s George Floyd protests spurred worldwide reexamination of names and monuments connected to racism.

Sir Francis Drake took part in some of Britain’s earliest slave trading voyages to West Africa in the mid 16th Century.

His namesake roadway was only partially stripped of the name in March.