The HistoryMakers Kicks Off Black History Month on PBS with a One-On-One Interview Program As Part of its Groundbreaking Business Initiative

BusinessMakers will focus on adding 150 additional interviews of noted African American business leaders to its collection – increasing The HistoryMakers over the next two to three years.
BusinessMakers will focus on adding 150 additional interviews of noted African American business leaders to its collection – increasing The HistoryMakers over the next two to three years.

The HistoryMakers Kicks Off Black History Month on PBS with a One-On-One Interview Program As Part of its Groundbreaking Business Initiative

The HistoryMakers has announced the one-on- one interview program, An Evening With Ken Chenault.

The hour-long program provides a rare, inside, look into the life and career of one of America’s most successful CEOs – Ken Chenault.

The program is hosted by CBS sportscaster and NFL network host James “J.B.” Brown and serves up a master class on corporate and civic leadership featuring interviews from those who know and have worked with Chenault during his phenomenal career.

Viewers will hear from Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway Warren Buffett; former Xerox CEO Ursula Burns; Merck CEO Kenneth C. Frazier; Lazard Freres Senior Managing Director Vernon E. Jordan, Jr.; Media legend Oprah Winfrey; Co-Founder and Co-Executive Chairman of The Carlyle Group David Rubenstein; former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg; Harvard President Larry Bacow and former Harvard University President Drew Faust; NBA legends and Hall of Famers Julius “Dr. J” Erving and Earvin "Magic" Johnson Jr.; Chair of

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts Katherine Farley; his sons Kenneth and Kevin Chenault and his wife, Kathryn Chenault, among many others. An Evening With Ken Chenault peers behind the veil of Chenault’s rise to the head of one of the world’s most successful companies, and sheds light on his effective leadership as well as his legacy.

In 2014, it was announced that the Library of Congress would serve as the permanent repository for The HistoryMakers Collection. Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden, interviewed by The HistoryMakers in 2010, added, “The HistoryMakers archive provides invaluable first-person accounts of both well-known and unsung African- Americans, detailing their hopes, dreams and accomplishments—often in the face of adversity, this culturally important collection is a rich and diverse resource for scholars, teachers, students and documentarians seeking a more complete record of our nation’s history and its people.”

To date, the organization has interviewed more than 3,200 HistoryMakers, with the goal of creating an archive of 5,000 interviews (30,000 hours) for the establishment of a one-of-a-kind digital archive.

A 501 (c) (3) national non-profit organization headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, is dedicated to recording and preserving the personal histories of well-known and unsung African Americans.

It is the largest video oral history archive of its kind, and the only massive attempt, since the WPA Slave Narratives of the 1930’s, to record the African American experience in the first voice.

The HistoryMakers unique context can be aggregated and packaged for delivery in a variety of distribution formats for different audiences such as corporations, higher education, museums and media.

Currently, the history of African Americans in business make up less than one percent of Harvard Business School case studies, and there are no dedicated exhibits or collection of African American business leaders in any of the nation’s repositories.

BusinessMakers will focus on adding 150 additional interviews of noted African American business leaders to its collection – increasing The HistoryMakers over the next two to three years.

Check your local listings for An Evening With Ken Chenault on Saturday, February 23, on WNET in New York, NY at 1:00 p.m.

For more information, visit The HistoryMakers website at: http://www.pbs.org/program/eveningken- chenault/ and to view trailer of An Evening With Ken Chenault at https://www.pbs.org/show/ evening-ken-chenault/

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