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THE DAUGHTER OF A KING

The Reverend Doctor Bernice A. King carries the legacy of one of Atlanta, GA’s most important families. She is often identified as the CEO of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Non-Violent Social Change.  But that’s not why she is interviewed for this podcast.  

Business ownership and financial independence are not usually discussed as being planks in the civil rights platform. Dr. Bernice ties them together and shares her thoughts about how a cultural trait she identifies as “I want to have my own” may be at odds with the ability to grow sustainable global enterprises. 

Dr. Bernice is a small business owner and has made United States history in the field of banking.  While being the primary keeper of her father’s legacy and the field of traditional finance seem far removed from each other, Dr. Bernice explains why they are more closely linked than most people realize.  She also tells listeners that Operation Breadbasket, one of the last programs established by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. before his assassination,  was an important component in the civil rights movement. Operation Breadbasket was operated by the S.C.L.C (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) It involved home ownership and business development in the African American community. 

This podcast shows how much her father,  the man she never got to meet as an adult, has shaped her aspirations in life.  It also highlights the influence her mother, Coretta Scott King, had in building her youngest daughter’s clear-headed approach to problems. 

Rev. Bernice King holds dual juris doctor, ( J.D.) and divinity degrees from Emory University.  She is also an ordained minister.  She takes her calling seriously and in this podcast, shares her belief that the hand of the Supreme Being has guided all of her choices in life which include where she got her education, how she met her business partner, Ashley Bell and the opportunity that allowed her to pray for a Catholic Pope. 

If you have ever had questions about the woman tasked with interpreting the concept of non-violence for current generations, listen to this podcast.  It will leave you enlightened and uplifted. 

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                                       LISA M BORDERS: THE OMNI-PRENEUR

There are legacy families in Atlanta, GA.  Some are internationally known for the influence they have had on Georgia based businesses.  Others have made different types of contributions to the metro area for generations, but most people only know the name of one family member. One of the goals of this podcast series is to look under the hood of success and examine some of the lesser-known components.  That’s why you’ll  learn a lot about family dynamics when you listen to the podcast episode about Lisa M. Borders.  

If you’re from Atlanta and older than 70, you might identify her as the granddaughter of the late Wheat Street Church pastor, Reverend William Holmes Borders, Sr.  If you’ve lived in town since the 1980s, though,  you might remember her as a former President of the Atlanta City Council and Vice-Mayor.  People who are long-term members of the area’s health community will know Lisa as the first person to lead a capital campaign for Grady Hospital and the person credited for financially rescuing the hospital system.  In the world of sports, she’s known as a former CEO of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) and she’s closely tied to leading endeavors for women’s rights.  She’s also chaired a global division for the Coca-Cola company.  

Each of those accomplishments is noteworthy.  Collectively, they make Lisa an omni-preneur. It’s a word she used to describe herself during the 90-minute interview she participated in for this edition of Atlanta Business League’s TELLING OUR STORY episode. 

Lisa tells stories that most people have never heard about several of her high-profile positions.  But she does something more.  She explains the motivation for choosing to endure verbal abuse, such as being called a racial slur every single day, during one phase of her education journey. She describes why she allowed herself to be treated like a chess piece by one of the most powerful business leaders in the city.  She also recalls, with joy, how what looked like projects likely to fail,  turned into some of the biggest blessings in her life – to date. 

The guiding factor in many of Lisa’s decisions is a chorus of voices that come from the elder members of her family.  They taught leadership by the lives they lived, fortitude by the challenges they conquered and the benefits of loyalty based on a foundation of love by simply supporting each other to the best of their abilities. 

One of the most incredible facts about the life of Lisa Borders is that it continues to evolve.  The podcast ends with one of the projects she is developing in 2025.  

The conversation with Lisa Borders  is mind-changing in many ways.  It explores education, corporate C-suite leadership, sports, politics and health care from the personal perspective of a woman who has made unique and powerful contributions to each industry.  What you will learn at the end of this podcast is that she has set her sights on doing even more in the years to come. 

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The purpose of this audio podcast series is to introduce listeners to successful African American business owners based in Atlanta and Georgia.  This episode is different.  You’re introduced to one man, Lonnie A. Saboor.  But his passion for the last 50 years has been to help small business owners become successful.  Most know him as the man who led the City of Atlanta’s economic development department for more than 40 years.  The people in that department, rebranded as Invest Atlanta and because of Lonnie produced more than 1,000 profitable business owners.  

But Lonnie’s track record of helping small business owners actually started before he became known as the Invest Atlanta “Money Man.”   He created an incredible financial infrastructure for the city’s Nation of Islam businesses when he was younger than age 25.  In this podcast, you’ll learn what he did to stymie the Internal Revenue Service by making decisions that were absolutely genius.

However, instead of applying his ability and access to resources only for himself, he shared his information about building credit, learning how to write a functional business plan and understanding the cyclical process of being an entrepreneur with anyone willing to learn.  That created a list of commercial wins that boosted commerce in Atlanta.  This podcast gives specific examples of the people behind those accomplishments.  Lonnie tells the story of how African American business owner, Howard Spillar brought the first Wendy’s franchise to the area.  He also explains why a man who came to him as a first-time business owner was able to grow sizable companies in two separate industries: food and real estate. 

The story Lonnie tells about two brothers who started a business with three brick-and-mortar Atlanta locations based on their mother’s recipes from India shows how inclusive the opportunities are in Atlanta, GA.  

What may really impress and surprise everyone though, is how long Lonnie has shared information with Atlanta’s community of new business owners.  Here’s a hint – he first took the job with the city in the 1970s. 

Although this podcast episode doesn’t focus on the success of one business owner, it does explain how Atlanta’s legacy of working collectively has spawned a foundation of economic stability that few other cities can mimic.  Lonnie’s professional life story also  showcases how opening the doors of opportunity to hard-working people from multiple cultures can create an entire eco-system based on sound financial principals that will grow and thrive for decades.  

This episode helps any listener understand more about why  metro Atlanta, GA provides a unique template for entrepreneurial success.  

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This episode follows the career highlights of Willie Watkins, a mortician. 

Willie doesn't like the word mortician. He starts the podcast explaining that he is an undertaker and then provides his definition of what an undertaker does.  It is unlike anything you have ever heard because Willie Watkins understands how to grab a person's attention.  He does that when he speaks and he does that when he stages funerals because he learned as a child that presentation matters.

The ceremonies honoring the dead that he saw as a child in Scottdale, GA motivated him to seek employment in the funeral industry.  He landed his first job at age eight. He spent almost every weekend from that point of time until he was nearly 30, working funeral services. 

He had a very successful real estate career before achieving his dream of founding a funeral home. 

The shifting racial composition in southwest Atlanta, GA neighborhoods meant there were a record number of homes being sold by white people and an equal record number of Black people ready to buy them.  Willie was the first Black mortgage representative for a nationally recognized real estate company.   He lived a flashy lifestyle and helped a lot of Black people find financing to buy homes.  However, he still worked for a small mortuary company on Saturday and Sunday, because that was his first passion.   Willie quit his  real estate job to start a funeral company.  However, the timing of his decision put him in a precarious financial situation. The bottom fell out of the housing market and Willie didn't have the money needed to start his funeral home.  

He got funding by turning to a segment of the African American community that few know.  

Numbers running was a bedrock industry in places with large Black populations. It was big business in Atlanta and Auburn Avenue was a major hub for kingpins.   Few can remember their names or how their underground businesses supported churches and politicians.  Willie does. He describes entrepreneurs who  both flourished on Auburn Avenue and ran numbers.  He also explains how the numbers runners were connected to his business. 

Willie's podcast story is more than a look at his life and business successes.  This episode opens a pipeline to the people and companies that made  Atlanta's Auburn Avenue  economically functional.  He  explains one of the reasons Black business owners could flaunt racially limiting financial and property owning laws of the times and set up their own system of financial support.  

Willie is an example of the type of business excellence based on hard work and a vision. But his story and his legacy are unique among Black business leaders in the south. He has not only created a company that he has efficiently scaled, but has done so while retaining the memories about Black entrepreneurs and communities from the 1960s through the 1980s. His humor, success and respect for the past make this podcast valuable because of the stories Willie tells and the names of Black business leaders who helped to make Auburn Avenue memorable. 

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Kent Matlock’s success is partially based on the fact that he has been guided by extraordinary men and women. Each of those influential people was focused on actions that were for the good of the greater community. But those actions also affected Kent as a developing professional in Atlanta.   

 His first major life event took place at age 13.  That’s when he morphed from being an average inner-city young person into a changemaker. Kent’s parents had moved him, and two siblings away from their urban Chicago, Ill neighborhood and into the rural, racially mixed town of Brownsville, TN.  That transition forced Kent to do a hard reset on his communication skills.  Brownsville taught him lessons about character that have influenced him for decades. 

 Several colleges tried to recruit him when he graduated from high school. He only applied to and was accepted by, one of them, Morehouse College.  The school’s president,  Dr. Hugh Gloster became the first of  Atlanta’s extraordinary leaders who saw something special in Kent.  He placed Kent in Morehouse’s public relations department. That position led to contact with Anheuser Busch beer and Kent’s first corporate job as the “Bud Man on Campus.” 

Morehouse College helped Kent find his calling in life. The close-knit college community also introduced him to Coretta Scott King. Though not in Kent’s class, both of Mrs. King’s sons attended Morehouse while Kent was a student. She immediately impressed the aspiring advertising professional with her grace and iron will.  Her goal during the early years of their professional friendship was to have her late husband’s birthday recognized as a national holiday in the United States. A few years later,  Kent played a minor role on teams from Georgia Pacific and Coca-Cola that aligned with Mrs. King as she pressed to achieve her goal.

 It was rare to spot Black or brown people in the advertising industry, working for major brands or targeting Black consumers, when Kent founded his advertising and public relations company, in the mid-1980s. He credits former mayors Andrew Young and  Maynard Jackson for allowing people like him to find professionally successful mentors within their own culture.  One of the people who mentored Kent was fellow Morehouse alum and  long-time Georgia Pacific corporate executive, Curley Dossman, Jr. Kent explains that Curley has helped him navigate the corporate decision-making process for 30 years. 

 Kent relied on the backdrop of Atlanta’s strong Black business community as he provided insights that helped his clients market to and motivate Black consumers to buy their products. He became one of the few Black advertising professionals who helped brands tap into what researchers McKinsey & Company described as the $1.98 trillion worth of buying power that exists in the African American community.  

During this 30-minute podcast, Kent explains his passion for his industry. He discusses the reasons it’s still difficult for Black and brown people and women advertising executives to land good positions at major firms.  He also talks about how the dollar-and-cents value of inclusion has little to do with diversity and equity.  Kent is candid about specific decisions in his personal life and why giving back to community organizations has allowed him to reap bushel-loads of emotional dividends.  

This podcast shows why he is a rare entrepreneur and how his success has changed lives for both consumers and advertisers in a meaningful way. 

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This is a story about storytellers.  Janis Ware has published the Atlanta Voice for 42 years.  It's a newspaper written for the African-American audience in Atlanta, GA.  

But there's more to her life's work.  It starts with her father, J. Lowell Ware an immensely talented and hardworking man who honored a deathbed request that changed his life.  Lowell was far-sighted, creative and had an extremely strong personality.  When he paid his only daughter's college tuition at the University of Georgia - she had planned to work with him only long enough to pay off her debt to him. It didn't work that way.

Instead, her father directed her to get a real estate and real estate broker's license and she discovered her passion for financial literacy.  She also developed a talent for flipping properties at a time when white Atlanta residents were moving to the suburbs.  She asked for and received 75 separate houses as donations to a community organization she and her father created.  They rehabbed the homes and sold them to families who wanted to live within the city limits.

Janis also talks about the incredible shifts that have taken place within the print industry and how those shifts have affected the reading habits of her audience.  Her ability to adapt is both admirable and amazing, but the good news about this story is that there is a third generation in the family that has already started to take the reigns of publishing the paper.  The younger generation is also adding ideas and potential streams of income to an Atlanta publication that has served its audience for 57 years - and counting. 

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This podcast is about two legal warriors who have spent the last 30 years protecting the concepts of equity in the courts, through analysis and by helping municipalities create policies that withstand assault.  

Rodney Strong and Delmarie Griffin are also a married couple who have come together from very different backgrounds. 

Delmarie was raised in Columbus, GA and attended an HBCU as an undergraduate and the University of Georgia for her law and business degrees. 
Rodney Strong was raised in Memphis, TN by parents who were active in the NAACP.  One of his strongest memories is being a 5-year-old child who couldn't go to McDonald's because it was segregated. 

Both came of age as Jim Crow racial separation ended and the struggle to merge ideals in the newly integrated workplaces began.  Rodney Strong was mentored by people who were looked at as giants in his home state and Atlanta, GA.  He gained a reputation for combatting, and winning against, court rulings that threatened the concepts of DEI  (diversity, equity and inclusion).  His life's work started when former Mayor Andrew Young hired him to be the compliance officer for the City of Atlanta.  It continues through his firm, Griffin & Strong PC.  
Delmarie worked as a corporate attorney for Hughes Aircraft for ten years.  She handled compliance and HR in government contracting with high clearance levels. 

The unexpected factor in this couple's story  is their  London School of Economics trained, Ph.D.-holding daughter.  She received a top-rated education and brought her skills back to the family firm as its director of operations.  

When this interview took place, one of the most unsettling court cases on affirmative action in higher education  in recent history had not taken place.  But Rodney and Delmarie  knew it was on the horizon and were already prepared to tackle its ramifications.  They also showcase that the skills and experience they bring to clients are often stronger than those offered by majority-owned firms that dabble in Griffin & Strong's chosen legal fields of compliance and equity.   

This podcast is both a profile and a story about family.  You will learn more than just what Delmarie Griffin, Dr. Imani Tucker and Rodney Strong do; you'll learn a great deal about who they are.  

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This  podcast is a 30 minute history lesson.  

When you listen, you'll hear stories about Black entrepreneurs who lived in  1800s, 1900s and 20th century that will make your jaw drop.  That's because William F. Pickard, Ph.D.  qualifies to be a part of this series for two reasons.  He's a very successful Black business owner  with more than 50 years of experience that includes owning a McDonald's franchise, a casino co-owner and being a parts supplier to major car manufacturers in Detroit, MI.  He's also a researcher and his field of choice is Black business history.  

He's a great story teller and  shares facts most people have never heard. 

He spends a little more than 30 minutes describing what Black people did about banking - in the days before white owned financial institutions would accept their business.  He tells a fascinating tale about the family of Horace L. King, a Black builder who started constructing bridges while enslaved.  He also explains why there were devastating financial penalties attached to several Black industries after integration swept the nation. 

Along the way he drops hints to the fact that he's a billionaire.  But he's one who is committed to Black business development and has backed that belief with his dollars.  

However,  it's probably the final story of the podcast that may stick with you the longest.  Dr. Pickard talks about how the  Negro Education Association in Georgia,   made all Black schools teach civics and political science classes - in 1920.  He doesn't say it.  But listeners will understand that a 20-year-old person taking one of those courses that year, wouldn't be able to apply what was learned - until 1964.  If that doesn't make sense to you - listen to the podcast.  It will.   You'll also see why it's a privilege and is of incredible value to have a gifted successful and articulate person,  show such passion for Black business history.  

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This is an episode about the second generation of an incredible African American family.   We describe the topics discussed as generational continuance. 

Herman Jerome Russell founded his Atlanta based construction company in 1952.  He made it one of the largest Black owned companies in the United States and then diversified.  He owned a beer distributorship.  He managed real estate and he raised three children with his first wife, Otelia Hackney Russell. 

Those children have run their father's companies for decades.  They are not resting on his accomplishments.  The awe inspiring futuristic look of Mercedes Benz stadium in Atlanta and the National Museum of African American Culture and History in Washington, D.C. were erected under the leadership of the 2nd generation of Russells.

But this isn't a podcast about buildings.  It's a story about families and what children remember when their father is building an empire.  

Michael and Jerome Russell discuss family dynamics, personal aspirations and what it was like to live in one of the most famous homes in Georgia as children. 
They also show a level of love and respect for each other and what their father's legacy that's both touching and inspiring. 

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Milton Jones, Jr.  is one of the most respected business leaders in Atlanta, GA.  He has a professional history in finance that spans decades and can trace his family tree back generations in Atlanta.  

However, there's one characteristic about him that  almost everyone knows.  Milton's mathematical skills are so formidable that he has a nickname.  He's known as the walking calculator.   It's an attribute that  has impressed many people during his years as an executive banker.  But his ability to conduct  complicated equations "in his head" started long before that.   More than one member of Milton's family seems to have had that same talent and they made sure he developed it - starting at age four. 

But this is not just a podcast about a gifted finance guy.  It's also the story of a family who knew that their legacy would be lived through decendents capable of increasing their assets by developing their minds.  Milton's professional life exceeded their expectations.  He understood the responsibility that came with the way he was raised before he went to college in Indiana.  

However, experiences in college allowed him to see life from a drastically different point of view.  It's a perspective that he carried with him after graduation and helped him to make history in the world of banking at age 39.  
He did amazing things in major financial institutions until he and three other experienced African Americans decided to start their own bank.  

It was a great success - until it wasn't. That didn't stop him or break his spirit.  In fact, he pushed past an incredibly unfair disappointment and co-founded a small business.  He still runs that company, and was doing so when he made history for a second time in his life.  

Milton Jones, Jr. is the first African American to chair the United Negro College Fund.  He took that position in 2022.  This year he added another prestigious title when the members of the 100 Black Men of America, Inc. voted him to be the chair of their 7,000 member organization.  

This podcast is about a fascinating, dedicated and gifted man who needs to write a book.  However, by the time the podcast ends you realize he's too busy sharing his incredible leadership gifts to do that.  So what you learn about this man's impressive life will have to be a placeholder until he has time to share stories about himself with a much wider audience.