A.G.Gaston aka Black Titan
Reading time: 3 – 4 minutes
By the 1960s, Arthur G. Gaston was probably the richest black man in America. He was the leading employer of blacks in Alabama and directly and indirectly gave substantial aid and comfort to the civil rights movement. In the decade after the Montgomery bus boycott, Martin Luther King Jr. and his allies used the A. G. Gaston Motel in Birmingham, Alabama, as a safe refuge to plan their activities. When Eugene “Bull” Connor, the notorious commissioner of public safety, had King arrested in 1963, Gaston put up the $160,000 bail money from his own pocket.
After serving in World War I, Gaston drove a delivery truck for a white-owned dry-cleaning company and, at perhaps the lowest point of his life, toiled as a coal miner. He was always alert to any opportunity to better his condition, though, no matter how modest. He tried out an idea to turn a profit by selling boxed lunches prepared by his mother to his fellow miners. It was such a success that he started to sell popcorn and peanuts on the side. Gaston saved an amazing two-thirds of his combined income at this time. Once he had enough money in hand, he took on the informal role of banker, extending loans at 25 percent interest to his coworkers.
Gaston was a pioneer among black entrepreneurs in the aggressive use of vertical integration. He began with insurance but moved on to control other parts of the process, such as undertaking and casket manufacturing. He also purchased a cemetery. “As Carnegie was to steel,” Jenkins and Hines perceptively observe, “Gaston was to dying” Over time, Gaston branched out into other ventures, including the Booker T. Washington Business College; the Brown Belle Bottling Company (his only significant failure); the Citizens Federal Savings and Loan Association, one of the leading black-owned banks in the United States; and the A. G. Gaston Motel in Birmingham. The motel, which opened in 1954, featured performances by such entertainers as Stevie Wonder and Little Richard, and the guest list included Colin Powell.
Gaston always put greater stress on long-term economic improvement than on short-term civil rights struggles. More than once, this approach put him at odds with men such as Fred Shuttlesworth and King, who wanted to push faster and to deemphasize quiet compromise. Events such as the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing and Bull Connor’s decision to sic the dogs on protesters prompted Gaston at times to take action faster than he would have liked.
During the 1
960s, Gaston was a voice in the wilderness as an apostle of the need for blacks to accumulate “Green Power” by going into business. Only in the last few years before his death at age 103 in 1996 was he able to witness the first glimmerings of a reawakened interest in the importance of business enterprise.
Read All About Him Yourself – I did can’t you tell!
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Wow! Hell, I kinda feel ashamed that I don’t know this story. Especially since I can rattle off King, Shuttlesworth, and crew. All you ever hear about Black people at that time is that they were just holding hands, singing We Shall Overcome, and praying for white mercy. I’m ordering the book today.
What shocked me is his approach to business is damn near spot on to mine. I am always shocked but I shouldn’t be that other Blacks have done stuff before I did but since they aren’t out in the open you kind of have to dig in the crates.
Citizens bank in Atlanta just merged with his bank in Alabama. So there is a very local connection. Even after his death the company is into construction and a whole bunch of other avenues. The guy was about his chips.
Here’s a more in depth link to look at:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_25_100/ai_81223152/
I believe the type of business he was into, he was about civil rights through economic empowerment. He was building banks and colleges, not a hip-hop clothing line or ownership stake in a NBA team.
Money talks….something else walks….
You know people don’t like to think about doing regular business. You always hear some cat doing party promotions, or wannabe modeling agencies or a record company with a street name like Do Do tube records!
The cat did some simple burial, insurance, banks and hotels angle. Stuff that people actually need not on some Hip Hop night at my club stuff. This is why the cat had money because no one was there and no one would copy off of him.
People got this business angle all messed up. They really believe a club makes more money than actually selling furniture. It’s becuase cats want to be famous more than they want money.
People are actually saying what do I feel like selling instead of what can I sell that people want! People got the game backwards!
Thanks for telling this story. People need to hear it. Being a native of Alabama, I am very familiar with the contribution and legacy of Mr. A.G. Gaston. You’re so on point with this!
He’s one of my favorite examples of the DO FOR SELF mentality. A lot of people think that a Black man building and doing for self is far fetched. The way people think these days they’d rather go and work for someone else and get scared when anyone tells them they can control their own life.
So A.G Gaston did what he could in the times he was in. He made businesses that served the Black Community. The same blueprint works today but now people want to start a club instead of a dry cleaners. So maybe it’s just the time we’re in. It’s a ME ME ME way even in business when the key to any business is serving your customer’s NEEDS!
Thank you for the history lesson. I love hearing about African America who did things that were successful. I love hearing about how they were determine to make things better for our people.
Sunny D – Welcome! No problem I like to learn about them myself so I might as well put them up on the blog! Just one more Black Businessman we can recite instead of saying the dude who used to own BET!
I know that’s right.
I know I’m super late but I learned about this book through your Recommended Books list, and after reading an excerpt from Amazon, I immediately ran to the local library (for the free) and checked it out. Man! This is a really good read. Put me on to the whole “vertical integration” mindset.. now instead of just tutoring, i’m also looking at a day camp in the summertime, as well as a newsletter to jump-start what i eventually hope (and am diligently grinding towards) is a school in the hood. Big up!
Welcome Lis! Yeah Gaston was definitely on some Vertical Integration angle. I like to call it buy or become your supplier. I’m all for a school in the hood because God knows we need those who can to come back and teach those who can’t. Good luck with what your endeavors and let me know if I can be of any assistance.
Thanks for this great story. I like learning and reading about my peoples success. I will be buying this book.
It’s really a great book! The guy pretty much teaches you how to own your hustle from the rooter to the tooter! It’s a great story and a great man!