We would love to hear from you. Click on the ‘Contact Us’ link to the right and choose your favorite way to reach-out!

wscdsdc

media/speaking contact

Jamie Johnson

business contact

Victoria Peterson

Contact Us

855.ask.wink

Close [x]
pattern

Industry News

Categories

  • Industry Articles (21,155)
  • Industry Conferences (2)
  • Industry Job Openings (35)
  • Moore on the Market (414)
  • Negative Media (144)
  • Positive Media (73)
  • Sheryl's Articles (800)
  • Wink's Articles (353)
  • Wink's Inside Story (274)
  • Wink's Press Releases (123)
  • Blog Archives

  • March 2024
  • February 2024
  • January 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • August 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • November 2008
  • September 2008
  • May 2008
  • February 2008
  • August 2006
  • Universal Life Building’s Beacon To Shine Again

    April 18, 2015 by Wayne Risher, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn.

    April 18–Universal Life Insurance Co. was a business incubator, proving ground for young executives and source of middle class jobs for black Memphians when segregation barred most doors to opportunity.

    When the company’s headquarters went vacant in 2001, many feared the imposing Egyptian Revival building at Danny Thomas and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard wouldn’t survive as a symbol of African-American hope and pride.

    But a $6.2-million redevelopment, bolstered by public incentives, appears on track to write the next chapter in the building’s storied history. It’s proposed to be refurbished as environmentally sustainable office space, complete with a green roof and solar collectors, and positioned to help lead revitalization of a neglected pocket of Downtown.

    Along with Beale Street, Robert R. Church Park, Clayborn Temple and other nearby sites, Universal Life is part of a concentration of institutions that were prominent in the lives of black Memphians, particularly during segregated times.

    “It’s our version of the Harlem Renaissance,” said city housing and community development director Robert Lipscomb, who has long advocated a comprehensive neighborhood redevelopment strategy called Heritage Trail that “is about restoring the context and content and character” of sites including the Universal Life building. Lipscomb was making an analogy to New York’s Harlem neighborhood, which underwent a cultural, social and artistic golden era in the 1930s.

    Universal Life Insurance was founded at Beale and Hernando in 1923 with Dr. J.E. Walker, A.W. Willis and M.W. Bonner as charter officers.

    The company moved to 234 Hernando before building its headquarters at what was then the northeast corner of Linden and Wellington in 1949. The building was designed and built by the African-American firm McKissack and McKissack.

    When Walker’s son A. Maceo Walker ended a 35-year run as president in 1990, it was the nation’s fourth largest black insurer, with $67 million in assets and more than $650 million of insurance in force. The insurance industry was changing rapidly at that point, however, and Universal was trying to change with it by promoting larger life insurance policies and increasing its sales force’s efficiency.

    A Baltimore company bought Universal Life in 1998, and the building gradually emptied. Left behind were names of officers and departments etched on beaded glass door windows, a time clock, cafeteria and reception hall and a distinctive neon clock marking the street corner.

    Elaine Lee Turner, co-owner of Heritage Tours, said there’s strong interest in the building from people who take tours focusing on African-American history.

    “I was hoping it wouldn’t go the way of many other things Downtown, another parking lot,” Turner said. “I was elated that the building was going to remain in the black community. The land, the building, all of that was purchased by black Memphians, who pooled their funds and pulled together something of note that stays for ages.”

    Architects Juan Self and Jimmie Tucker bought the building in 2006 and assembled a redevelopment package that ran aground in the recession. This time around, the difference-maker is public incentives and funding and an anchor tenant, the city-owned Renaissance Business Center, which has signed a 10-year lease for about 13,000 square feet, including street-level space flanking Universal Life’s old main corridor.

    Self Tucker Properties LLC has secured $1.08 million in city grants, a $1.975 million Green Communities Grant backed by bonds for energy efficient improvements, a property tax freeze of up to 10 years and a $300,000 development loan. The owners have a commitment for a $1.8 million loan from First Tennessee Bank to go with $595,492 in owner equity.

    The firm will renovate a building that has been a symbol of pride and hope, particularly among black Memphians who grew up in the civil rights era.

    “Universal life was the big kahuna and that building was a point of pride,” said insurance agent and former City Council member Fred Davis, 80. “I am not aware of an African American business that had the dominant effect of black capital that Universal Life had in Memphis at that time.”

    “Universal Life gave young black professionals a place to work with high levels of dignity and camaraderie,” added Davis, who owns Fred L. Davis Insurance.

    Davis’ wife, Ella, got her first job at Universal after graduating from Tennessee State University. Davis worked for North Carolina Mutual as a debit insurance agent, going door to door selling policies and collecting premiums.

    Universal brought Art Gilliam’s father to Memphis from Nashville and later put teenaged Gilliam to work as a salesman. Gilliam, 72, became the city’s first black radio station owner in 1977 when he bought WLOK, where he is president and general manager.

    Gilliam said Universal’s leaders founded Tri-State Bank and figured prominently in other African-American institutions including Walker Homes, an early middle-class subdivision for blacks, Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church, the NAACP and the Shelby County Democratic Club.

    “The context is we’re talking about a segregated society, so the opportunities were relatively few for black entrepreneurs,” Gilliam said.

    Universal and Tri-State were staunch supporters of civil rights, said Turner, 70. “Quite often when protesters were jailed, they were the backbone of financial support as far as providing bail money, along with others, the churches and so forth,” he said.

    Universal’s lower level meeting hall and cafeteria were a hub of social life.

    “We couldn’t use the hotels for different meetings and functions,” Turner said. “That building had a wonderful facility where the black community could have social events. In the time of segregation, when there were so many doors closed to African-Americans, that was one of those businesses that could be a role model and something we could look up to.”

    Plans call for an exhibit about the history of Universal Life in the lobby area off King Boulevard. The cafeteria will be outfitted with a catering kitchen to accommodate events such as lectures focusing on revitalization.

    Self, a native of Clarksdale, Mississippi, came to Memphis with the McKissack firm to help design the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel. Tucker is a native Memphian. They plan to move their 15-employee firm from the Tennessee Lofts in the South Bluff area to a large, open space that formerly housed the Universal Life clerical pool.

    They anticipate construction beginning this summer and taking about a year to complete. Tucker said the clock on the sidewalk worked until the building’s utilities were cut off. It will be restored, probably at the beginning of construction, as a symbol of what’s to come.

    Anchored by the Renaissance center’s small business resources, the building is envisioned as a hotbed of creativity and innovation focused on uplifting the neighborhood on the southern edge of Downtown, Tucker said.

    Gilliam said he was thrilled about the plans.

    “I was elated when I read that,” Gilliam said. “I was just driving by there the other day and it took me back 40 plus years. I love the fact that something that positive can be done with that building.”

    ___

    (c)2015 The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, Tenn.)

    Visit The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, Tenn.) at www.commercialappeal.com

    Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

    Originally Posted at InsuranceNewsNet on April 17, 2015 by Wayne Risher, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, Tenn..

    Categories: Industry Articles
    currency