Jesse Hill

Jesse Hill Jr. (May 30, 1926 – December 17, 2012) was an African American civil rights activist. He was active in the civic and business communities of the city for more than five decades.^[1] Hill was president and chief executive officer of the Atlanta Life Insurance Company, from 1973 to 1992, and was the first African American to be elected president of a chamber of commerce in a major city. During Hill's presidency of the Atlanta Life Insurance Company it became the largest black-owned life insurance company in the nation.^[2] He was a member of the board of directors for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta.

Early life, education, and career

Born in 1927 in St. Louis, Missouri, to Nancy Dennis Martin and Jesse Hill, he attended public schools in St. Louis and graduated from Lincoln University in Jefferson City with a bachelor's degree in mathematics and physics in 1947. He received his MBA from the University of Michigan in 1949.

From the beginning, Hill's professional and civil rights activities were closely intertwined. His career in business began in 1949 when he moved to Atlanta, the center of African American entrepreneurship in the United States during the mid-twentieth century. He joined the Atlanta Life Insurance Company, one of the country's largest and most successful black-owned businesses, as assistant actuary; he was only the second African American actuary in the country. When he first moved to the city, Hill lived at the Butler Street YMCA in Atlanta, the headquarters of the city's black leadership during the period. He also volunteered for both the Urban League and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Business and civic activities

During his first two decades with Atlanta Life, Hill became vice president and the chief actuary of the company. In 1973 he was elected president and chief executive officer, becoming the company's third president and the first not to be a family member of Alonzo Herndon, Atlanta Life's founder. During Hill's tenure as chief executive, Atlanta Life experienced a significant period of growth. Total assets, revenues, profits, and shareholder value all surpassed previous levels.

During the 1950s and 1960s, Hill used his position of prominence in Atlanta's black business community to promote civil rights in Georgia and Alabama. In 1960 Hill, along with other young black leaders of the Atlanta Committee for Cooperative Action, including Grace Towns Hamilton and Whitney Young, produced a survey of Atlanta's black population entitled "A Second Look: The Negro Citizen in Atlanta." This document challenged a common belief in Atlanta's white community that the city was a shining beacon for racial harmony in the South, "the City Too Busy to Hate." As a member of the NAACP's education committee, Hill began recruiting black students to challenge segregation in Georgia's colleges and universities. He met with students Hamilton Holmes and Charlayne Hunter to discuss plans to desegregate Georgia State College (later Georgia State University). At Holmes's request, however, the plans were modified and efforts were focused instead at the University of Georgia (UGA) in Athens. Holmes and Hunter were ultimately the first two African American students admitted to UGA.

Hill's company was also involved in activities to help black communities across the South. During the 1950s and 1960s, Hill raised money from employees at Atlanta Life and donated the funds to Martin Luther King Jr.'s efforts to promote civil rights. Hill also encouraged employees to donate their time in support of the civil rights movement. Atlanta Life's Montgomery office even employed Rosa Parks as a secretary during the Montgomery bus boycott, which she sparked.

Hill and Atlanta Life Insurance Company worked to increase African American access to affordable home-mortgage financing in Georgia, Alabama, Texas, and Florida. Hill also organized successful voter registration drives in Atlanta throughout the late 1960s and 1970s. These efforts aided a campaign which eventually registered an estimated 50,000 new African American voters in Atlanta.

Governor Jimmy Carter selected Hill to chair the State Board of Regents in 1973. Following Carter's election as President, he chose Hill to chair the Minority Business Resource Center, a group created by Congress.

In 1977 Hill became the first black chairman of the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, where he continued to work on bridge building between the African American and white communities. Hill ran political campaigns for Maynard Jackson, who became the first black mayor of Atlanta, as well as for congressman Andrew Young who later became United Nations ambassador. He was the first black president of the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and the first black member of the Board of Directors for Rich's Department Store.^[3] He chaired the All-Citizens Registration Committee and helped to desegregate the Atlanta Public School system. Hill created the black newspaper The Atlanta Inquirer which covered racial tensions, sit-ins, and protests.

Retirement and recognition

Hill retired from Atlanta Life in 1995. During the 1990s, Hill received an honorary doctor of laws degree from his alma mater, the University of Michigan. In 2001, in recognition of contributions to the city, Butler Street in Atlanta was renamed in Hill's honor.

Hill served on the boards of directors for eight major U.S. corporations, including Knight Ridder, Delta Air Lines, National Services Industries, and SunTrust, and was a founding director of MARTA, Atlanta's public transportation system. He has also served as the chairman of the board of directors for the Martin Luther King Jr. Center in Atlanta. He was involved in the development of wireless communications in Nigeria.

Hill and his wife, Azira, have two children and several grandchildren.

References

• This article incorporates material written by Barton Myers of the University of Georgia for the New Georgia Encyclopedia ("NGE"), posted or last updated March 10, 2006. All derived works must credit the NGE and the original author.

Further reading

• Alexa Benson Henderson, A Twentieth Century Black Enterprise: The Atlanta Life Insurance Company, 1905–1975 (Ph.d. diss., Georgia State University, 1975).
• William Schemmel, "Profile: Jesse Hill Jr.," Atlanta Magazine, January 1971.