Description
The grandson of slaves, born into poverty in 1892 within the Deep South, A. G. Gaston died greater than a century later with a fortune price smartly over $one hundred thirty million and a industry empire spanning communications, actual property, and insurance coverage. Gaston used to be, by means of any degree, a heroic determine whose wealth and affect bore comparability to J. P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie. Right here, for the primary time, is the tale of the lifetime of this unusual pioneer, instructed by means of his niece and grandniece, the award-successful tv journalist Carol Jenkins and her daughter Elizabeth Gardner Hines.
Born at a time While the sour legacy of slavery and Reconstruction nonetheless poisoned the lives of black American citizens, Gaston used to be made up our minds to make a distinction for himself and his other people. His first task, after serving within the celebrated all-black regiment throughout Global Battle I, certain him to the close to-slavery of an Alabama coal mine—However even Right here Gaston noticed now not handiest wish However probability. He introduced a industry promoting lunches to fellow miners, quickly based a rudimentary financial institution—and from then on there used to be no preventing him. A type of black Horatio Alger, Gaston allow a unmarried, robust query be his information: What do our other people want now? His luck flowed from an uncanny genius for understanding the solution.
Combining wealthy circle of relatives lore with a deep wisdom of American social and financial historical past, Carol Jenkins and Elizabeth Hines spread Gaston’s luck tale towards the backdrop of a century of crushing racial hatred and bigotry. Gaston now not handiest survived the hardships of being black throughout the Despair, he flourished, and by means of the Fifties he used to be ruling a Birmingham-based totally industry empire. While the motion for civil rights swept throughout the South within the overdue Fifties and early Nineteen Sixties, Gaston supplied very important financial make stronger to many activists.
At the time of his demise in 1996, A. G. Gaston used to be some of the wealthiest black males in The us, if now not the wealthiest. However his legacy prolonged some distance past the financial. He used to be a person who had proved it used to be imaginable to triumph over dazzling odds and make a spot for himself as a pacesetter, a captain of trade, and a some distance-sighted philanthropist. Writing with grace and gear, Jenkins and Hines deliver their outstanding ancestor totally to lifestyles within the pages of this e-book. Black Titan is the tale of a person who created his personal long run—and within the procedure, blazed a long run for all black businesspeople in The us.
