Clifton Taulbert was born in 1945 in Glen Allan, Mississippi, a small town in the Mississippi Delta. He graduated valedictorian from O’Bannon High School in Greenville, Mississippi, in 1963. He received his Bachelor of Arts in History and Sociology from Oral Roberts University and graduated from the Southwest Graduate School of Banking at Southern Methodist University. He later obtained an associate degree in health care management from Tulsa Community College.

Clifton also spent a few years in the United States Air Force, where he attained the rank of sergeant and served in a classified position with the 89th Presidential Wing of the US Air Force in Washington D.C. He is now an internationally acclaimed speaker, author, entrepreneur, and filmmaker.

Taulbert has authored thirteen books. He was the winner of the NAACP’s 27th Image Award for Literary Work: Nonfiction for his book When We Were Colored, which was produced as a film.

In 2014, Taulbert published his fourth memoir titled The Invitation. It is the story of a supper invitation to a former plantation house in Allendale, South Carolina, in which the adult Taulbert confronts his childhood memories and the legacies of slavery and segregation which must still be acknowledged in his grown-up circumstances.

Taulbert has been a banker, a health care administrator, and now is the president of The Freemount Corporation, a marketing company in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

He has been recognized internationally by the Sales and Marketing Academy of Achievement, the Library of Congress, the NAACP, and Rotary International as a Paul Harris Fellow. He has served as a guest professor at Harvard University, the University of Virginia Darden School of Business, and the United States Air Force Academy.