Staking a Claim; Jake Simmons and the Making of an African-American Oil Dynasty
New York: Atheneum, 1990. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. 25 cm. [8], 311, [1] pages. Illustrations. Bibliography. Notes. Index. Publisher's ephemera laid in. Author Jonathan Greenberg is an award-winning national investigative journalist, editor, author and new media innovator. Jonathan's career began as a fact checker at Forbes Magazine, where he advanced to the role of the lead reporter in creating the first Forbes 400 listing of wealthy Americans. Jonathan has been an investigative financial and political journalist for such publications as The New York Times, The Washington Post, New York Magazine, Forbes, and The New Republic. Jonathan's nearly 40 years of reporting experience has been enhanced by a Yale Law School Masters Degree program, from which he graduated with honors in First Amendment Law from internationally renowned attorney Floyd Abrams and then Yale University President Benno Schmidt. Jonathan is the author of the critically acclaimed biography Staking A Claim: Jake Simmons and the Making of an African-American Oil Dynasty. Derived from a Kirkus review: The biography of a fascinating American black whose had an intriguing background and productive life. Greenberg has managed with the help of surviving family members and archival sources to reconstruct the stormy passage of a rugged individualist. Born in 1901 near Muskogee, Simmons had a frontier childhood on his parents' cattle ranch. A 1914 visit by Booker T. Washington took him to Tuskegee Institute. In the early 1920's, Simmons entered the oil business, brokering leases for black farmers and, later, their white counterparts throughout the Southwest. He then moved onto a larger stage, acting as a middleman for such major multinationals as Phillips Petroleum and Texaco in West African nations. A lifelong civil-rights activist, Simmons in 1937 initiated one of the earliest school-desegregation suits to reach the Supreme Court. Greenberg makes a good job of recounting Simmons' heritage, career, and legacy and of honoring a man whose accomplishments speak for themselves. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: African-Americans, Creek Indians, Indian Territory, Ghana, Segregation, Booker T. Washington, Tuskegee, Jake Simmons, Civil Rights, Integration, Robert Kerr, Muskogee, Nigeria, Oklahoma, Phillips Petroleum, Segregation
ISBN: 0689117914
[Book #30407]
Price: $37.50