Percy Garnett Williams (May 4, 1857 – July 21, 1923) was an American actor who became a travelling medicine salesman, real estate investor, amusement park operator and vaudeville theater owner and manager.

At his death, he endowed his Long Island house as a retirement home for aged and destitute actors.

[3] He spent two seasons in Brooklyn, then returned to Baltimore and was the leading comedian in the Holliday Street Theater stock company.

Williams would enlist a local citizen in each town he visited to try wearing a liver bag, and to then tell the public how much better he felt.

He partnered with Thomas Adams, the chewing gum magnate, to buy what is now Bergen Beach, Brooklyn.

This was 300 acres (120 ha) of marshland in Brooklyn west of Rockaway and south of Flatbush on Jamaica Bay.

[3] Williams and Adams had meant to build housing, but decided to emulate the successful Coney Island.

[8] Williams also opened Zip's Casino, a beer hall in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

[3] In March 1902 the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company offered to buy the Bergen Beach resort, but would not meet Williams' price.

He also ran the Novelty in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, sometimes shuttling acts by carriage so they could play both theaters on the same day.

[5] Percy Williams continued to expand his operation, partnering with wealthy and well-connected men who could overcome problems with permits and licenses.

[9] The city of New York had "Blue Laws" that banned theatrical performances on Sundays, but did not enforce them strictly.

[11][12] In 1910 Williams staged a production called The Wow-Wows at the Alhambra, Bronx, Orpheum, Greenpoint and Colonial Theatres.

[9] Percy Williams became a thirty-second degree Mason and grand treasurer of the Elks for the United States.

Most of the property, including a nine-hole golf course, was sold by the trustees in 1973 so they could expand the Actors Fund Home in New Jersey.

[10] The Orpheum became part of the RKO chain, and was converted to showing only films after the Albee Theatre opened in 1925.

Later it became Hampden's Theatre, the RKO Colonial cinema, an NBC and then ABC television studio, and in 1974 briefly became home of the Harkness Ballet.