Latest / The Steve Harvey Morning Show / Shomari Wills Full Interview

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Shomari Wills Full Interview · The Steve Harvey Morning Show

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  Speaker 1: a parent, now is the time to get an amazing
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  Speaker 1: deal one more time. By raycon dot Com slash I
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  Speaker 1: Heart My Next Dance received his undergraduate degree from more
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: House College and Atlanta, Georgia. Here's a journalist, writer, and
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Emmy winning TV producer. He's worked for CNN and Good
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Morning America. He's the author of Black Fortunes. Please welcome
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  Speaker 1: to Money Making Conversation, SAMRII Wheels, Hey, I appreciate that
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  Speaker 1: kind of puction. I'm so happy he's happy to be
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: on your show with Honor. Hey. But I hope, I hope.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: I'm the I know your show, but your book been
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: getting out that they've been getting great reviews, and you
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: broadcasting live in Atlanta. Of course you'll be heard on
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: our Heart Radio podcasts and UH series X in one
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: for the one and one for the two HBCU campus
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: because I really, I really want to make sure that
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: HBC hbc U campuses get this message because it really
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: is UH. It's something about because it's about entrepreneurship and
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: that's that millennial generation is talking about. That's what they
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: want to be and to hear about people who can
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: talk about overcoming the odds, overcoming a slavery, overcoming racism.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: I'm overcoming Jim crow Laws, how did you when you
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: started getting to this? Let's give everybody your backstory on
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: what got you started and saying this is a book
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: I should be engaged with. So you know, not to
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: be too long winded, but I started your story and
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: turn your story. I started out in journalism in New
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: York at the New York carab News, which is like
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: the new spaper for the Caribbean community in New York.
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  Speaker 1: And I was in Jamaica for for a little while
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  Speaker 1: doing some reporting, and I happened to visit this place
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  Speaker 1: called Devin House, which you know, is this mansion. It's
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: incredible mansion that has a restaurant and ice cream shop
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  Speaker 1: at it, and you know, everybody's like, you gotta go
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  Speaker 1: to the ice cream is really good. You know, I
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  Speaker 1: went there, and you know, it's also the house of
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  Speaker 1: the first black millionaire uh in Jamaica that they've kind
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  Speaker 1: of repurposed as an ice cream shopping all this other stuff.
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  Speaker 1: So I just I just went on the tour of
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  Speaker 1: the mention. They told me this guy's story. You know,
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  Speaker 1: he was a carpenter on a ship, you know, in
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  Speaker 1: the eighteen forties shipwrecked. He uh you know, this is
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: right off the coast of Venezuela. He swam to the
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  Speaker 1: coast and found a gold mine, uh and became a millionaire.
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  Speaker 1: So after you know, you know, find out about him
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  Speaker 1: and this is incredible story and all the things he
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: did with as well. I actually thought about writing a
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  Speaker 1: book about him, but you know, you know, like like
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: like Zara had to come back to the States, so
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  Speaker 1: unfortunately I couldn't today in Jamaica forever. So um, what
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  Speaker 1: I what I did is I I kind of adapted
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  Speaker 1: that idea and I started looking at African American millionaires
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  Speaker 1: here and I really wanted to tell the stories of
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  Speaker 1: the very first because most folks don't even know, you know,
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  Speaker 1: who they are. Well, I definitely on the one I
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  Speaker 1: knew was Madam C. J. Walker that you that you
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  Speaker 1: cover in this book because you know Black History Month
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  Speaker 1: they always bring up. You know, she started basically hair
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: care products and she made her wealth through that. And
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  Speaker 1: so when you when you when you talk about her,
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  Speaker 1: I love the fact that you said she was the
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  Speaker 1: only one that really you know, flaunted her wealth. You know,
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  Speaker 1: she bought the car, she bought, the range, she bought
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  Speaker 1: the house, and she wore the clothes. You know. So
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  Speaker 1: why do you think that she chose that path of saying, Hey,
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  Speaker 1: I'm making this money and I'm going to live the
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  Speaker 1: lifestyle of what I what I'm making. Um, you know,
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  Speaker 1: I think that was always her claim the same you
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  Speaker 1: know that you know, she kind of lived, you know,
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  Speaker 1: a really ostentatious lifestyle. She wasn't the first, you know
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  Speaker 1: person you know, she wasn't really the black hair pioneer
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  Speaker 1: a lot of folks think she she was. There's another
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  Speaker 1: uh woman named Annie Malone who also was a black
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  Speaker 1: millionaire who she worked for, and you know, you know,
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  Speaker 1: you know, they kind of had a competition thing. It's
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  Speaker 1: very controversial, um, you know, because her products were basically
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  Speaker 1: the same as Annie Malone's when she went out on
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  Speaker 1: her own. Um, but you know, she you know, just
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  Speaker 1: you know, coming out of the Jim Crow era, you know,
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  Speaker 1: in the early nineteen hundreds, and you know, black folks
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  Speaker 1: were starting to, uh, you know, feel like maybe it's
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  Speaker 1: okay to show off some of what we had, and
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  Speaker 1: she just kind of took it to the next level.
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  Speaker 1: She spent a lot of money. Uh, you know, she
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  Speaker 1: shot or fifth Avenue um. You know, so everybody knew
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  Speaker 1: about her wealth, as opposed to the folks who came
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  Speaker 1: before her, who had to worry about lynching things. And
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: you know, I had to worry about all sorts of
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  Speaker 1: you know, bad things happening to them. So they were
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: a little bit more in the cut Let me let
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  Speaker 1: was just such a stage here because I want people
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  Speaker 1: to understand exactly what we're talking about. Because we read
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: about today's black billion there as Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jordan, Tyler, Perry,
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: Kevin Harden, many more in their sports and entertainment industry.
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  Speaker 1: But your book tells the story about this country's first
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  Speaker 1: black millionaires, some of them born in the first half
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  Speaker 1: of the n eineteenth century, decades before the Emancipation Proclamation.
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  Speaker 1: I think that that's important that people to understand that
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  Speaker 1: these people were out there being um industrious in an
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  Speaker 1: era where you know, you were supposed to stay in
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  Speaker 1: your place, lynching was just a norm. Uh. And I
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  Speaker 1: want to talk about you. You talked about six people
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  Speaker 1: in the book, Well you talked about more, but six
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  Speaker 1: people really were identified to Mary Ellen Pleasant, Robert read Church,
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  Speaker 1: Hannah Elias uh Any, Turnbow Turnbow Malone, and we had O. W. Gurley,
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  Speaker 1: and we had Madame C. J. Walker. I want to
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  Speaker 1: talk about each one of them a little bit. I'm
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  Speaker 1: not I don't want to give way the book, but
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  Speaker 1: I thought it's important that you put your spin on
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  Speaker 1: while each one was significant and why you chose to
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  Speaker 1: follow their story. And let's start with Mary Ellen Pleasant,
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  Speaker 1: you know, who contribute a lot, a lot of money
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  Speaker 1: and almost went broke when you tried to further the
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  Speaker 1: cause of abolitionist John Brown. Yeah. So, I mean, you know,
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  Speaker 1: she actually did end up going broke. I mean said
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  Speaker 1: an incredible story story because she was born free in Massachusetts.
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  Speaker 1: I started in Philadelphia. She grew up in Massachusetts on
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  Speaker 1: the island of Nantucket, which was white. All the big
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: whaling boom was going on, all the Moby Dicks sort
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  Speaker 1: of stuff. Would a habit kind of catch whales and
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  Speaker 1: become risk that way. She grew up in that and
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  Speaker 1: so Nantucket was a boomtown because welling was really really,
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  Speaker 1: really profitable. Um when she reached the womanhood, she ended
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  Speaker 1: up going to San Francisco during the gold Rush. Um,
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  Speaker 1: you know, his folks were making a lot of money
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  Speaker 1: out there, and you know she kind of, you know, miraculously,
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  Speaker 1: she kind of knew what to do when she got
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  Speaker 1: there because she had grown up in a boomtown. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: because it was just booming. So you know, whale oil,
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  Speaker 1: you know, which was like the you know, petroleum was
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  Speaker 1: like the gasoline of the era. Was its like the
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  Speaker 1: second and third most profitable business in America at the time.
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  Speaker 1: So you know, she knew what it was like to
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  Speaker 1: be in a booming area and you know, how to
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  Speaker 1: make money. And so what she did is she went
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  Speaker 1: about providing services to the miners. She didn't try to,
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: of course, go mind's gold herself. She opened uh, you know,
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  Speaker 1: boarding houses, She became a money lender. Uh, she traded
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  Speaker 1: in silver. She just had her things, her hands and everything.
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  Speaker 1: In California, in San Francisco. She stayed behind the scene.
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  Speaker 1: She she stayed behind the scenes. You know, she she
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  Speaker 1: she was active, but you know she always you know,
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  Speaker 1: worked with men, you know, a lot of times worked
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  Speaker 1: with you know, Caucasian's um. So a lot of folks
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  Speaker 1: did not know that she was necessarily the one, you know,
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  Speaker 1: sort of with the money, uh and you know, with
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  Speaker 1: the insights. So she made a lot of money, and
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  Speaker 1: you know, she ended up in eighteen fifty eight, you know,
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  Speaker 1: having a meeting with John Brown. Uh, you know, the
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  Speaker 1: revolutionary started trying to try to start a slavery fault
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  Speaker 1: in America, and she gave him forty five thousand dollars um.
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  Speaker 1: You know, so he he started his slave regard at
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  Speaker 1: Harvest Ferry, which failed, of course. And uh, after that happened,
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: you know, folks started trying to track down everybody who
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: was associated with her. So she went into uh, you know,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: she went into hiding. Uh. You know, she's basically you know,
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  Speaker 1: broke or didn't have access to any of her money
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  Speaker 1: at that point. And she had a come back. Yack,
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: we're gonna back. We're gonna come back a little bit
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: on the next break, and we're gonna talk about the
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: other five people that you featured in this book. An
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: amazing book. If you're an entrepreneur, you gotta buy this
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: book because the fact that you say, hey, I'm gonna
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: gainst the odds. They really were against dogs. We were
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: back with more with Shamari Wills and this amazing book
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: from HarperCollins. Hi this Rashan McDonald back with money making
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: conversations on the phone, I have Shamari Wills. He is
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: the author of Black Fortune, tells the story of six
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: uh six millionaires Black millionaires, including Lando on A Robert
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: Reid Church. Uh Here's an interesting fact that I got
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: from the book. Between the years of eighteen thirty and
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: eighteen twenty seven, as the last generation of Blacks born
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: in the slavery with reaching maturity, a small group of
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: industrious to nations and darren men and women broke new
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: ground to attain the highest level of financial success. But
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: here's something about slavery. The lifespan for an enslaved African
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: American was between twenty two and thirty six years. That's that.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: That's an incredible stat that knowing at you know, if
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: you hit forty, you you were lucky to hit forty
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: years of age. So when you were when you was
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: building this information about this story, I'm sure there was
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: some some points in it that made you very emotional. Yeah,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: you know, I mean that that was one of them,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: you know, you know, just realizing how short you know
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: a lot of the of these folks lives you know,
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: were you know, and how hard the life of being um,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: you know, enslaved. It was and how hard you know, uh,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: you know folks fought, you know to end slavery. You know,
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: so it's just it was. It was you know, emotional
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: and Griffin, yeah, many different points. Yeah, that that's that's that.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: When I read that, I went, wow, that's really really
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: really amazing. Well we we we featured several in several
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: situations in this book. I severn, I should say millionaires
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: of the book and Robert read Church, all right, he's responsible.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: I would like to say for Bill Street in Memphis, Tennessee. Um,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: let's talk about his story and why I was important
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: to have him in louded in this book. You know,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: I think robbery Church in my opinion, you know, he's
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: up there with one of the with the most impressive
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: Americans to ever live. So you know, he was born
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: into slavery, you know, to a uh, to a white man,
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: to a steamship owner and his his his black concubine. Uh.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: And basically he was raised on his father's steamship as
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: a slave, you know, sort of working in the kitchens
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: and all that sort of stuff. Um. And you know
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: these steamships they did two things. They were luxury transportation,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: up and down the Mississippi, but the main source of
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: revenue was that they shipped cotton. So he was enslaved
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: on his ship shipping cotton, uh, you know, down the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: Mississippi to the port of New Orleans to get shipped
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: all over the world. Um. So eventually he escaped. Um
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: he you know, you know, he jumped over and in
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: the Mississippi outside of Memphis, and he you know, swims
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: the freedom, you know, watches up on the shore of
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: men this and sort of builds a life for himself. Uh.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: And you know, nothing was ever easy. You know. He
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: was always involved in real estate and you know, owning
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: bars and parlors and different things of that nature. Um.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: And everything he had, you know, at some point someone
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: tried to take it from him. He was you know,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: had two different assassinations at him. He was shotting here twice,
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: got in the head twice, you know. Uh, you know,
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: just had to deal with you know, you know groups
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: of you know, uh you know, white white race. Mom's
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: good friends of his with Lynch at some point. So
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: he kept the pistol on his side at all times.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: And he just never gave up, uh and became this big,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: big time real estate owner in Memphis and used his
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: money in his power to help black politicians along the way. Um,
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: you know, and at the end of his life he
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: was even friends with Roosevelt's friendly with the President. So,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, he's just had an amazing stories. He's he's
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: one of my favorite historical Well let's let's be honest
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: about it. Basically, his wealth saved Vincus because he one
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: of the first people who bought a bond. Absolutely absolutely, absolutely,
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: not just black Memphis, Memphis in general. Memphis had a
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: bad yellow fever outbreak um in the eighteen seventies which
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: almost destroyed the city. Um. You know, you know it's
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: you know, I think something like a fifth of the
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: population died and people were just leaving the city like crazy. Uh.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: In Memphis was completely bankrupt. Um. So as they tried
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: to rebuild the city, they needed people to loan their money. UM.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: So they issue bonds, and the first person to buy
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: a bond was Robert Church, a black man UM in
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: the southern city. And you know that, you know, kind
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: of when he stepped out, you know, other businessmen started
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: buying bonds as well. So he had a big part
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: in saving Memphis and bringing it back. Let's talk about
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: a couple of questions. I want to ask you, in
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: what way is the book you wrote different from the
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: book you set out to write. Well, I think the
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: biggest way is I kind of, you know, wanted to
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: kind of try to as best I could, you know,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: put down on paper who the first black millionaires actually were.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: And you know, they were all over the place. Bob
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: Church was in Memphis, Mary Ellen Pleasant in California. O. W.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: Gurley and Oklahoma, Hanna Elias and New York, um, you know,
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Annie Malone and you know, the Midwest. But so I
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: didn't expected stories to intersect, but they actually did a
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: lot because the black business community, right Nick, and you
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: know book Rite Washington actually had a organization, the National
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Negro Business League, and they would have conventions every year
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: and a lot of them met there. Plat of them
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: also knew Frederick Douglas when he was alive and book
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: uh book watching of course, and W. E. B. Dubois.
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: So just how much of their story is intersected, even
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: though they were in different parts of the country. Uh,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: you know, it was sort of amazing to me. We're
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: really interesting. This is kind of like the hidden figures
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: for entrepreneurship, because we don't know about these people and
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: what they've accomplished and effect that they accomplished on such
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: great odds, great odds and the you know adversity. Why
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: don't we know more of mar these are black millionaires? Well,
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I asked myself that question when
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: I was writing this. You know, I think part of
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: it is that people think Madam T. J. Walker is
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: the first black millionaire, and that was kind of a
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: black history non facts. You know, It's been pushed out,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: been pushed out a lot, and I even heard of
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: growing up. Um, So I believe me, believe you're the
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: only one. Mr Wills. I was right there with you
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: when I read your book. I went, okay, now I'm
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: educated properly, right, you know. And she never really had
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: a million dollars. I mean she was, she became wealthy
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: towards eighteen eighteen, eighteen nineteen, uh, you know, but there
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: were folks that had, you know, a millionaire status, you know,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: in the you know, in the eighteen fifties and eighteen sixties,
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: you know, you know, fifty years, half a century before that, um,
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: you know, And so I think it's part of it. C. J. Walker.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: Memph is a big part of it um and you know,
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: I'm just happy to try to try to get the
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: information out there, you know, for folks to know that
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: there is a history of us having well, history of
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: us being successful uh in business. M The dates back,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: you know, a really really long time monger than most
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: of us. Things. First of all, I want to make
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: sure we people understand this about our conversation. There's nothing
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: negative about what we're saying about Madam C. J. Walker.
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: Want to make sure people understand that it's just the
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: information that's been given to us over the years. We
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: have not been given the full story. And that's what
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: your book delivers. Your book is delivering the full story
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: if you if your person who wants to understand the
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: the pitfalls of entrepreneurship overcoming the odds. You know, Church
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: is a great story because when there was when there
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: was a disaster in the city of Memphis, he was
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: right there to take advantage of it. The the the
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: That's what made him small, That's what made these individuals
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: they were. They were always visionaries. They were all forward
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: thinking people. They're all people who all an opportunity and
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: they jumped on it. They didn't then and capitalize on it.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: And I think that is the story that that I
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: feel that if you're an entrepreneur, and this book is
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: about entrepreneurship, and I feel people should read it if
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: you're thinking about if you're end if your small business owner,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: or or a fortunate company, I feel you should read
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: this book because of the fact that it allows you
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: to understand how you can win against all odds. That's
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: the biggest takeaway I got from your book, Wills. I
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: appreciate that, you know, I mean, and I think people
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: always ask me, like, what is you know? This book
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: takes place so long in the past, you know how
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: to apply to business people now. And I think the
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: trade that these folks had is that they were visionaries
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: with like you said, and they weren't necessarily looking to
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: go into traditional businesses or you know businesses and black
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: people had gone into before, you know, like restaurant owning
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: or grocery stores or catering, which where the biggest businesses
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: for black people at the time. Um, they were looking
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: at high growth, you know, high risk cot reward industries.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: You know the gold rush, you know, becoming a real
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: estate owner in the rebuilding you know, southern city building
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: a town. One of the characters in My Annie Malone
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: she built the black hair business when there was no
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: such thing, and so they were not looking at, you know,
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: what's the traditional business for people to go into. They
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: were looking at for big opportunities. They were trying to
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: they were really on the cutting edge for their time.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: And you know, I think that something replies today with
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: tech and artificial intelligence and you know, biotechnology. Uh, you know,
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: it would be great to see more black folks trying
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: to be on you know, the cutting edge and taking inspiration,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: you know, from these folks, cause we're really underrepresented in
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: a lot of those areas well. I had the same
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: conversation with Lania Richardson, he's the over the Rutgers School
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: of Business. He was saying the same thing, you know,
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: and the drones, Um, all automatic cars are just not
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: going to the traditional restaurant, car wash, the services that
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: we tend to fall into on the regular basis. There's
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: so many uh, you know, artificial intelligence, there's so many
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: levels of uh, the STEM programs that we need to
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: be rushing into because of the fact that technology is
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: not going anywhere. But I want to just let you
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: know that your book, Black Fortunes, the story of the
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: first six African Americans who escaped slavery and became millionaires,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: is an amazing book. It is a must read book.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: I've enjoyed. It also has pictures. The thing I loved
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: about the book is just how you allowed the stories
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: to be told. You just didn't do a chapter completely
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: about the story. You showed how they kind of like
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: they kind of cross paths, and I thought that was
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: really impressive. Mr Wills. I appreciate that. I appreciate that.
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much. If you want to buy this book,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: go to Amazon. Just just type in Black Fortunes. It
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: will pop right up and they should give you a
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: short bio about the book, and uh, let you understand
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: you're about to read something very significance. You keep up
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: the great work, my friend. I hope we run path
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: a cross paths in the future. Let me sai. I
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: appreciate it. Thank you for having me on. Listening makes
• 20:02
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