The Associated Press

CENTRALIA, Wash. - Following his mother's lead, a 53-year-old doctor in Onalaska has come forward to talk openly about his heritage as the mixed-race grandson of the late South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond, a former segregationist.

Dr. Ronald Williams, an emergency room physician at Morton General Hospital, spoke proudly about his grandfather in an interview with The Chronicle of Centralia and said he regrets he wasn't closer to Thurmond.

``I can't imagine not being able to claim your own father,'' Williams told the paper in a copyright story published Wednesday. ``It was even hard for us not to acknowledge it, and we were more distant.''

The family kept its relationship to Thurmond a secret for decades until Saturday, when Williams' mother, Essie Mae Washington-Williams, announced that she is the illegitimate daughter of Thurmond and Carrie Butler, a maid for the Thurmond family. Thurmond was 22 and Butler was 16 when Williams was born in Aiken, S.C., in 1925.

Her four children followed her lead in keeping the secret until Thurmond died, so as not to tarnish his political career. They knew from childhood that Thurmond was their grandfather.

``We didn't know the significance of it until we got older, but, like my mother, we didn't make a big deal of it because of the embarrassment,'' he said.

``She respected him and she loved him, although she didn't have that close daily contact with him. That's why she didn't come forward and give in to the temptation for interviews.''

After Thurmond died in June at age 100, Williams felt free to tell her story.

In 1981, on a trip to Washington, D.C., he met with Thurmond as an adult.

``We didn't speak about anything profound. He congratulated me on my successes and encouraged me to continue,'' he said.