William Rogers, who goes by the nickname "Brother", became the director of the Programs and Communication Division of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History in 2017. From 1990 to 2016, he was the associate director of the John C. Stennis Center for Public Service in Starkville, Mississippi. Before joining the Stennis Center, Brother served as a legislative assistant to U.S. Representative Donald Payne of New Jersey. Brother graduated magna cum laude in 1987 from the University of Alabama, where he earned a bachelor of arts degree in economics, was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, and was selected as a Harry S. Truman Scholar from Mississippi. He holds a master's degree in public affairs (MPA) from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. He grew up in Brandon, Mississippi and was a high school exchange student in Kyoto, Japan.