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Authors: Henry Louis Gates
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this same building to see Mr. Rockefeller. And I went in and he said, “Why are you back here? I told you I wasn’t going back on that board.” And I said, “Well, I came to make my case. I need your help. We need your help.” And then he says, “I’m not gonna do it.” And then I proffered to him the letter that his mother wrote to the five boys about social corporate responsibility. He said, “I know what my mother wrote and I’m still not gonna do it, and I don’t know why you bothered to come back.” And I stood up and said, “Mr. Rockefeller, thank you for your time. I will do it without you.” We shook hands and I walked out.
A year later, after Whitney Young had died, maybe a month or so after— Whitney died on March 11, 1971—Mr. Rockefeller invited me back. I come into the building and I go into his office and he’s sitting there with Douglas Dillon, who was secretary of the treasury under Kennedy. “The last time you left here, young man, you were in a huff,” he said. “But you said that you were going to do it without me and you did it. You’ve done a very good job,” he added. We raised $10 million my first year for the College Fund. A lot of money. And Mr. Rockefeller said, “Now, I want to ask you to do something for me,” and I said, “Yes, sir, what is it?” and he said, “I want you to become a Rockefeller Foundation trustee.” And I said, “Mr. Rockefeller, I’ve got better judgment than you. The answer is yes.”
And so, not every time that I come in this building, but many times when I come in and head up that elevator, I think about that moment, when Mr. Rockefeller told me again he wasn’t coming back on the board of the College Fund. I felt okay, though; I didn’t feel vulnerable. I’d asked him and he’d said no, that I was wasting his time and mine. It’s very important to know when people are saying no and to get out of their way. I’d come back a second time thinking I had a chance, and I knew that he wasn’t going to be better. The Rockefellers had been very involved with the founding of the College Fund, as they were with Spelman and with other important institutions, and I knew what I had to do at the time. Later, some good came out of it. Mr. Rockefeller eventually came back on the board of the College Fund, after my time there. In the Rockfeller Foundation context, we became friends. I became good friends with his son Jay and with his brothers Nelson and David, and I attended the funerals of Mr. Rockefeller and Nelson.
Now the integration of corporate America is in a different phase. A group of us, including Leon Sullivan, Frank Thomas, Jewell Lafontant, Patricia Harris, Bill Coleman, and others, were among the first blacks on corporate boards. But we’ve come a long way from the seventies if you think about Dick Parsons, CEO at AOL Time Warner, Ken Chenault of AmEx, Stan O’Neal of Merrill Lynch, and Frank Raines of Fannie Mae. These four black men control in excess of $300 billion in market capitalization, and they employ some 300,000 people. That was inconceivable in my time, and now they are CEOs at companies that would not have hired their parents, except in menial jobs.
Some people in the community say these guys and other successful blacks are not brothers anymore. But that’s something you have to live with. People say things they don’t even mean and certainly do not understand. When I was doing voter registration in the South, I was considered the militant. Then I’d go to work for the United Negro College Fund and find out I’d become a Tom. Same person, same beliefs.
It’s important to the progress of our people that black people like Ken Chenault and Dick Parsons and Frank Raines and Stanley O’Neal are occupying these positions of power. It’s important in that it says to young people that they can do it too—that anything you want to achieve can in fact be achieved. But it says something else. It says that if you have the
A year later, after Whitney Young had died, maybe a month or so after— Whitney died on March 11, 1971—Mr. Rockefeller invited me back. I come into the building and I go into his office and he’s sitting there with Douglas Dillon, who was secretary of the treasury under Kennedy. “The last time you left here, young man, you were in a huff,” he said. “But you said that you were going to do it without me and you did it. You’ve done a very good job,” he added. We raised $10 million my first year for the College Fund. A lot of money. And Mr. Rockefeller said, “Now, I want to ask you to do something for me,” and I said, “Yes, sir, what is it?” and he said, “I want you to become a Rockefeller Foundation trustee.” And I said, “Mr. Rockefeller, I’ve got better judgment than you. The answer is yes.”
And so, not every time that I come in this building, but many times when I come in and head up that elevator, I think about that moment, when Mr. Rockefeller told me again he wasn’t coming back on the board of the College Fund. I felt okay, though; I didn’t feel vulnerable. I’d asked him and he’d said no, that I was wasting his time and mine. It’s very important to know when people are saying no and to get out of their way. I’d come back a second time thinking I had a chance, and I knew that he wasn’t going to be better. The Rockefellers had been very involved with the founding of the College Fund, as they were with Spelman and with other important institutions, and I knew what I had to do at the time. Later, some good came out of it. Mr. Rockefeller eventually came back on the board of the College Fund, after my time there. In the Rockfeller Foundation context, we became friends. I became good friends with his son Jay and with his brothers Nelson and David, and I attended the funerals of Mr. Rockefeller and Nelson.
Now the integration of corporate America is in a different phase. A group of us, including Leon Sullivan, Frank Thomas, Jewell Lafontant, Patricia Harris, Bill Coleman, and others, were among the first blacks on corporate boards. But we’ve come a long way from the seventies if you think about Dick Parsons, CEO at AOL Time Warner, Ken Chenault of AmEx, Stan O’Neal of Merrill Lynch, and Frank Raines of Fannie Mae. These four black men control in excess of $300 billion in market capitalization, and they employ some 300,000 people. That was inconceivable in my time, and now they are CEOs at companies that would not have hired their parents, except in menial jobs.
Some people in the community say these guys and other successful blacks are not brothers anymore. But that’s something you have to live with. People say things they don’t even mean and certainly do not understand. When I was doing voter registration in the South, I was considered the militant. Then I’d go to work for the United Negro College Fund and find out I’d become a Tom. Same person, same beliefs.
It’s important to the progress of our people that black people like Ken Chenault and Dick Parsons and Frank Raines and Stanley O’Neal are occupying these positions of power. It’s important in that it says to young people that they can do it too—that anything you want to achieve can in fact be achieved. But it says something else. It says that if you have the
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