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Season 3, Episode 2 - Building Black Wall Street 2.0
With Doug Speight, serial entrepreneur, former executive director of American Underground, and UNC-Chapel Hill MBA alumnus
Many people are familiar with the entrepreneurial renaissance that’s taken place in Durham, NC. But do you know the history and on-the-ground dynamics that accelerated the city toward an economic and social resurgence that parallels its past? As a Durham native, serial entrepreneur and then executive director of American Underground, Doug Speight has deep business roots in the area and saw firsthand how the downtown startup hub and co-working space rapidly established the Bull City as a modern entrepreneurial epicenter.
Speight reflects on the driving forces behind the city’s entrepreneurial present and future, but also on the current-day connections its early twentieth-century history, when Durham boasted a thriving downtown African American business district known as Black Wall Street. Listen to his behind-the-scene insights on how Durham’s decision to carve out an entrepreneurial hub that began in the basement of the American Tobacco complex brought together startups, investors and the community to spark an economic revival. Looking forward, Speight discusses new pathways for economic gain and diversity made possible as Durham’s entrepreneurial ecosystem invites more people from the black, Latinx and LGBTQ communities become tech business leaders.
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By On The Heels of Innovation
5
22 ratings
With Doug Speight, serial entrepreneur, former executive director of American Underground, and UNC-Chapel Hill MBA alumnus
Many people are familiar with the entrepreneurial renaissance that’s taken place in Durham, NC. But do you know the history and on-the-ground dynamics that accelerated the city toward an economic and social resurgence that parallels its past? As a Durham native, serial entrepreneur and then executive director of American Underground, Doug Speight has deep business roots in the area and saw firsthand how the downtown startup hub and co-working space rapidly established the Bull City as a modern entrepreneurial epicenter.
Speight reflects on the driving forces behind the city’s entrepreneurial present and future, but also on the current-day connections its early twentieth-century history, when Durham boasted a thriving downtown African American business district known as Black Wall Street. Listen to his behind-the-scene insights on how Durham’s decision to carve out an entrepreneurial hub that began in the basement of the American Tobacco complex brought together startups, investors and the community to spark an economic revival. Looking forward, Speight discusses new pathways for economic gain and diversity made possible as Durham’s entrepreneurial ecosystem invites more people from the black, Latinx and LGBTQ communities become tech business leaders.