Constance H. Williams - Early Life

Early Life

Connie Williams was born in Long Branch, New Jersey, to Leon Hess and Norma Wilentz. Her father was the founder of the Hess Corporation and the owner of the New York Jets; her mother was the daughter of David T. Wilentz, who served as New Jersey Attorney General (1934-1944) and successfully prosecuted Bruno Hauptmann in the Lindbergh kidnapping trial, and the sister of Robert Wilentz, who served as Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court (1979-1996). The oldest of three children, she is the sister of John B. Hess, the current chairman of Hess Corporation. She graduated from Rutgers Preparatory School in 1962, and then studied at Barnard College, where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English in 1966.

Williams received a Master of Business Administration degree from the Wharton School of Business in 1980. She worked as a small business consultant and a staffer for U.S. Representative Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky. She also became active in local politics, serving as chairwoman of the Democratic committee of Lower Merion and Narberth.

She is married to Sankey V. Williams, who is the Sol Katz Professor of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and the chief of general internal medicine at the university hospital; the couple has two daughters.