The History Makers

Earl G. Graves, Sr., founder
and CEO of Black
Enterprise Magazine, was
interviewed by The
HistoryMakers on December
18, 2000. For over thirty
years, Black Enterprise has
been the leading voice in
African American
entrepreneurialism and
business. Serving on the
boards of directors of several
major corporations, Graves
has been awarded more than
fifty honorary degrees and
praised for his inspiration
and dedication. Graves is
the true embodiment of
success. A summary of his
interview follows:
was swimming there. He
continued,“My mother really
fought the fight.”
During his high school years,
Graves was inspired by a
Brooklyn librarian to attend
Morgan State University in
Baltimore. He worked hard to
pay his own way, and with a
few hundred dollars in his
pocket, he went off to school.
There, Graves joined the
ROTC while working several
jobs.
After graduating in 1957,
Graves entered the military,
attending both the Airborne
Training Academy and Ranger
School.“I found that the
training for Special Forces was
clearly much more
Earl Graves
“The legacy I want to leave is family”
From humble but hardworking roots in the Bedford
Stuyvesant neighborhood of New York, Graves’ career has
included owning a publishing empire, an events marketing
and promotions company and the largest minority-owned
Pepsi-Cola franchise in the country, to name just three of
his accomplishments. His childhood was a disciplined one.
“My dad was a very strict disciplinarian,” Graves recalls,
“democracy in our house was with a very small ‘d.’”
Graves’ father, Earl Godwin Graves, was fervent about his
son’s studies, and if Graves was not
studying, he was working. His
mother Winnaford, a slightly-built
woman, would go to bat for her
son. Graves recalls one particular
childhood incident where he and
his brother were told that they
could not swim in the local
YWCA pool. On hearing this, she
became “this woman 6 foot 3
inches standing there with flames
coming out of her eyes and nose
and ears.”They returned to the
pool, and a few days later, Graves
10 The HistoryMakers Winter 2004
Earl Graves elementary school class photo at P.S. 44 in Brooklyn, New York
(1947). (Photo courtesy of Earl Graves)
demanding,” he recalls,“but I relished it.” After two years,
Graves was honorably discharged and returned to New
York, where he joined the National Guard and the
prestigious Green Berets.
By 1965, Graves had entered the world of politics working
as an administrative assistant to then-Senator Robert
Kennedy;“The unbelievable we did immediately.The
impossible took a little longer. But you learned if he said,
‘I’m coming to town,’ and you were the advanceman, you
got there and you made sure there
was a crowd if you had to pull a fire
alarm.” Following Kennedy’s
assassination in 1968, Graves and
several other staff members were
given Ford Foundation work-study
grants. Graves used his grant to
study entrepreneurship in the
homeland of his grandparents,
Barbados.While there, he observed
“although the country government
was black run, the businesses were
not necessarily owned or controlled
by people of color.” This revelation