Black History

The Untold Stories of Blacks in Business

THE WESTSIDE GAZETTE — While most Black businesses showed surprising growth and diversity leading up to the Civil War, what enabled their success was the Black participation in the banking system. Leading into the early twentieth century, Black-owned insurance companies, caterers, funeral homes and burial services were among the emerging industries for Black entrepreneurs.

Published

7 years ago

May 5, 2019

Oakland Post

By Carma Henry

Business is much on our minds at The HistoryMakers. Not only are we in the midst of assembling the nation’s largest repository of video oral history on the subject of Blacks in business, but PBS recently aired An Evening with Ken Chenault, which is airing again this week along with our premiere of BOSS, the two-hour long feature of the Black experience in business. BOSS has received rave reviews including one from Mary Wilson of The Supremes who noted, “It was riveting I could not take my eyes off it.” While BOSS represents an important start, it is by no means comprehensive. There are many, many stories within The HistoryMakers archive and still more that have not been documented. Consider the following:

While most Black businesses showed surprising growth and diversity leading up to the Civil War, what enabled their success was the Black participation in the banking system. Leading into the early twentieth century, Black-owned insurance companies, caterers, funeral homes and burial services were among the emerging industries for Black entrepreneurs including John Merrick who founded North Carolina Mutual Life in 1899 to become the nation’s largest Black insurance company, and Alonzo Franklin Herndon, who was born a slave and made his fortune as a barber and then as a real estate investor. He ultimately purchased a failing mutual aid society and turned it into the Atlanta Life Insurance Company. The late former CEO of Atlanta Life Financial Group, Ronald Brown recalled, “Alonzo Franklin Herndon, who was a former slave, had what was then referred to as the finest barbershop in the Southeast, and all of his customers were white. And they did not even know that Mr. Herndon owned the barbershop. They thought he worked there. And to make them feel comfortable, he actually would enter through the back door of his own establishment.”

Coupled with white resistance and the global economic collapse during the Great Depression, Black businesses were hit particularly hard. What followed were some of the greatest Black entrepreneurs like A.G. Gaston, who owned a number of businesses and played a significant role in the struggle to integrate Birmingham in 1963. Real estate entrepreneur and civil rights activist Joe Dickson remembered how Gaston gave him $200 a week so he could study and pass the bar exam. Entrepreneur Comer Joseph Cottrell recalled his father’s advice to Gaston to start an insurance company, “He met A.G. Gaston, who had a funeral home, and he befriended A.G. and told him about the insurance business and told him that since he had a funeral home, that in the State of Alabama at the time, you weren’t required to have a certain capitalization to start a burial insurance company. All you had to have is a funeral home with the ability to bury the people. So, my dad talked him into setting up a burial insurance company and that was Booker T. Washington Insurance.”

There is also, of course, the histories of individuals like S.B. Fuller, featured in the BOSS film, who built an empire of personal care products with Fuller Products and became the largest Black-owned business from the 1940s to the early 1960s. Fuller also served as a role model for George Johnson who founded Johnson Products. Johnson reflected on how Fuller got his start, “He started with twenty-five dollars, which was a refund from insurance on his car. He took that twenty-five dollars, and he bought soap, and he hand-made labels, put them on the soap, and started selling soap with the money that he got from that. From that he turned it into soap, and he turned the soap into money, just turning that over. And eventually he added other things, and that was the start of Fuller Products in 1936.” Johnson Products would go on to be the first African American company listed on the American Stock Exchange. That legacy of entrepreneurship was not lost on Johnson’s son Eric Johnson who later bought Baldwin Ice Cream Company, which he merged with Richardson Foods to become Baldwin Richardson Foods and has grown it into a $300 million company.

Soft Sheen hair care company founders Edward and Bettiann Gardner launched their hair care empire from their basement, Bettiann Gardner recalled how her husband would experiment with new products to sell. After several rejections and modifications, her husband noted, “I went back in the basement and started putting my pot back on again and started taking some wax out and doing a lot of things to it.” When he found something that worked, his wife said, “I’m gonna go down there in the basement with you with my pad and pencil and I’m gonna write down everything you put in and the quantity. So that it will become a formula and you’ll be able to duplicate it every time the same way.”

While BOSS features John H. Johnson, founder of Johnson Publishing Company and Earl Graves, founder of Black Enterprise magazine it does not touch upon Edward Lewis, Clarence O. Smith, Cecil Hollingsworth and Jonathan Blount, founders of Essence magazine or Bob Johnson the founder of BET or Oprah Winfrey, all media moguls in their own right. And then there is Reverend Jesse Jackson and his role in the financial industry with the Wall Street Project. This is the just the tip of the iceberg, and it is our goal to bring more stories to light.

This article originally appeared in The Westside Gazette.

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Activism

Oakland Post: Week of December 24 – 30, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of – December 24 – 30, 2025

Published

21 hours ago

December 25, 2025

Oakland Post

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

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Alameda County

Bling It On: Holiday Lights Brighten Dark Nights All Around the Bay

On the block where I grew up in the 1960s, it was an unwritten agreement among the owners of those row homes to put up holiday lights: around the front window and door, along the porch banister, etc. Some put the Christmas tree in the window, and you could see it through the open slats of the blinds.

Published

5 days ago

December 21, 2025

Oakland Post

Christmas lights on a house near the writer’s residence in Oakland. Photo by Joseph Shangosola.

By Wanda Ravernell

I have always liked Christmas lights.

From my desk at my front window, I feel a quiet joy when the lights on the house across the street come on just as night falls.

My father, the renegade of the block, made no effort with lights, so my mother hung a wreath with two bells in the window. Just enough to let you know someone was at home.

Two doors down was a different story. Mr. King, the overachiever of the block, went all out for Christmas: The tree in the window, the lights along the roof and a Santa on his sleigh on the porch roof.

There are a few ‘Mr. Kings’ in my neighborhood.

In particular is the gentleman down the street. For Halloween, they erected a 10-foot skeleton in the yard, placed ‘shrunken heads’ on fence poles, pumpkins on steps and swooping bat wings from the porch roof. They have not held back for Christmas.

The skeleton stayed up this year, this time swathed in lights, as is every other inch of the house front. It is a light show that rivals the one in the old Wanamaker’s department store in Philadelphia.

I would hate to see their light bill…

As the shortest day of the year approaches, make Mr. King’s spirit happy and get out and see the lights in your own neighborhood, shopping plazas and merchant areas.

Here are some places recommended by 510 Families and Johnny FunCheap.

Oakland

Oakland’s Temple Hill Holiday Lights and Gardens is the place to go for a drive-by or a leisurely stroll for a religious holiday experience. Wear a jacket, because it’s chilly outside the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, at 4220 Lincoln Ave., particularly after dark. The gardens are open all day from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. with the lights on from dusk until closing.

Alameda

Just across the High Street Bridge from Oakland, you’ll find Christmas Tree Lane in Alameda.

On Thompson Avenue between High Street and Fernside drive, displays range from classic trees and blow-ups to a comedic response to the film “The Nightmare Before Christmas.” Lights turn on at dusk and can be seen through the first week in January.

Berkeley

The Fourth Street business district from University Avenue to Virginia Street in Berkeley comes alive with lights beginning at 5 p.m. through Jan. 1, 2026.

There’s also a display at one house at 928 Arlington St., and, for children, the Tilden Park Carousel Winter Wonderland runs through Jan. 4, 2026. Closed Christmas Day. For more information and tickets, call (510) 559-1004.

Richmond

The Sundar Shadi Holiday Display, featuring a recreation of the town of Bethlehem with life-size figures, is open through Dec. 26 at 7501 Moeser Lane in El Cerrito.

Marin County

In Marin, the go-to spot for ‘oohs and ahhs’ is the Holiday Light Spectacular from 4-9 p.m. through Jan. 4, 2026, at Marin Center Fairgrounds at 10 Ave of the Flags in San Rafael through Jan. 4. Displays dazzle, with lighted walkways and activities almost daily. For more info, go to: www.marincounty.gov/departments/cultural-services/department-sponsored-events/holiday-light-spectacular

The arches at Marin County Civic Center at 3501 Civic Center Dr. will also be illuminated nightly.

San Francisco

Look for light installations in Golden Gate Park, chocolate and cheer at Ghirardelli Square, and downtown, the ice rink in Union Square and the holiday tree in Civic Center Plaza are enchanting spots day and night. For neighborhoods, you can’t beat the streets in Noe Valley, Pacific Heights, and Bernal Heights. For glee and over-the-top glitz there’s the Castro, particularly at 68 Castro Street.

Livermore

The winner of the 2024 Great Light Flight award, Deacon Dave has set up his display with a group of creative volunteers at 352 Hillcrest Avenue since 1982. See it through Jan. 1, 2026. For more info, go to https://www.casadelpomba.com

Fremont

Crippsmas Place is a community of over 90 decorated homes with candy canes passed out nightly through Dec. 31. A tradition since 1967, the event features visits by Mr. and Mrs. Claus on Dec. 18 and Dec. 23 and entertainment by the Tri-M Honor Society at 6 p.m. on Dec. 22. Chrippsmas Place is located on: Cripps Place, Asquith Place, Nicolet Court, Wellington Place, Perkins Street, and the stretch of Nicolet Avenue between Gibraltar Drive and Perkins Street.

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Activism

Lu Lu’s House is Not Just Toying Around with the Community

Wilson and Lambert will be partnering with Mayor Barbara Lee on a toy giveaway on Dec. 20. Young people, like Dremont Wilkes, age 15, will help give away toys and encourage young people to stay in school and out of trouble. Wilkes wants to go to college and become a specialist in financial aid. Sports agent Aaron Goodwin has committed to giving all eight young people from Lu Lu’s House a fully paid free ride to college, provided they keep a 3.0 grade point average and continue the program. Lu Lu’s House is not toying around.

Published

5 days ago

December 20, 2025

Oakland Post

Tania Fuller Bryant, Zirl Wilson, Dremont Wilkes, Tracy Lambert and Dr. Geoffrey Watson. Courtesy Oakland Private Industry

Special to the Post

Lu Lu’s House is a 501c3 organization based in Oakland, founded by Mr. Zirl Wilson and Mr. Tracy Lambert, both previously incarcerated. After their release from jail, they wanted to change things for the better in the community — and wow, have they done that!

The duo developed housing for previously incarcerated people, calling it “Lu Lu’s House,” after Wilson’s wonderful wife. At a time when many young people were robbing, looting, and involved in shootings, Wilson and Lambert took it upon themselves to risk their lives to engage young gang members and teach them about nonviolence, safety, cleanliness, business, education, and the importance of health and longevity.

Lambert sold hats and T-shirts at the Eastmont Mall and was visited by his friend Wilson. At the mall, they witnessed gangs of young people running into the stores, stealing whatever they could get their hands on and then rushing out. Wilson tried to stop them after numerous robberies and finally called the police, who Wilson said, “did not respond.” Having been incarcerated previously, they realized that if the young people were allowed to continue to rob the stores, they could receive multiple criminal counts, which would take their case from misdemeanors to felonies, resulting in incarceration.

Lu Lu’s House traveled to Los Angeles and obtained more than 500 toys
for a Dec. 20 giveaway in partnership with Oakland Mayor Barbara
Lee. Courtesy Oakland Private Industry,

Wilson took it upon himself to follow the young people home and when he arrived at their subsidized homes, he realized the importance of trying to save the young people from violence, drug addiction, lack of self-worth, and incarceration — as well as their families from losing subsidized housing. Lambert and Wilson explained to the young men and women, ages 13-17, that there were positive options which might allow them to make money legally and stay out of jail. Wilson and Lambert decided to teach them how to wash cars and they opened a car wash in East Oakland. Oakland’s Initiative, “Keep the town clean,” involved the young people from Lu Lu’s House participating in more than eight cleanup sessions throughout Oakland. To assist with their infrastructure, Lu Lu’s House has partnered with Oakland’s Private Industry Council.

For the Christmas season, Lu Lu’s House and reformed young people (who were previously robbed) will continue to give back.

Lu Lu’s House traveled to Los Angeles and obtained more than 500 toys.