Publishing family legacy: 50 years later, still going strong

PAUL WILLIAMS III | THE CHARLOTTE POST

Charlotte Post co-publishers Robert (left) and Gerald Johnson have led the publication since 1986. Their father, Bill Johnson, bought The Post in 1974.

Gerald and Robert Johnson are optimistic about The Charlotte Post’s future.

Their father, Bill Johnson, learned journalism in the Army during World War II. After his discharge, he worked for several newspapers during a time when it was hard for journalists of color to get jobs with white-owned publications. The elder Johnson was the first Black reporter at a Charlotte daily as a freelance for the now-defunct Charlotte News. He also started a newspaper in the 1950s that closed after a couple of years.

When Bill bought The Post from Gaston Gazette publisher Garland Atkins in 1974, the brothers were on different career paths – Gerald as a Bank of America executive and Robert as a middle school teacher. In 1986, Gerald took a call from his father that changed the company’s course.

“I was told the meeting would take just 20 or 30 minutes,” Gerald recalled. “The meeting took almost an hour and a half. I had to be back at work within an hour. What he told me was that he needed someone to sit in his seat for about three months.”

Gerald and Robert knew their father was sick but were clueless about the severity.  

“I said no,” Gerald recalled. “I had to get back to work, so I told him I would do it just so I could go. Big mistake. Just as I was leaving, I asked him when I needed to start. This was on Friday. He said Monday.  “I thought he was kidding at the time, but he just told me that ‘My doctors told me I needed to get away.’ So, that Monday I had to figure out a way that I could come in and work and still keep my job at Bank of America. That is kind of how it all started.”  

Within three months, Bill Johnson was dead. Gerald was upset his father had passed, but also that he was left in a predicament that he felt obligated to keep the company running.  

“I never thought that after three months he was going to die,” Gerald said. “I thought after three months I’d be back to doing what I was doing before.”
The elder Johnson had a plan in place. He didn’t want his sons to know how sick he was at the time for fear they wouldn’t want to continue with the publication. After Bill’s death, Gerald met with Dr. Jerry Jones, who confided he knew about the scheme.

“‘(Bill) decided that you shouldn’t know (the severity of his illness),’ Gerald recalls Jones telling him. ‘After you (ran the company for three months) and then he died, he assumed you would fall in love with it.’” Bill was correct.
Robert, who was retired by then, saw the work Gerald was doing and felt the need to help.

“Once Gerald got things up and running pretty good, I saw the service and what the newspaper was doing,” he said. “The community loved the newspaper. At the time, we did not have a person in charge of putting the newspaper on the street. So, I figured that would be a good fit for me at the time.”

One thing Robert noticed was Gerald leveraged technology to put The Post ahead of other Black newspaper publishers. While many newsrooms used typewriters, Gerald bought three Macintosh desktop computers for word processing and production.

“None of the other Black newspapers that we dealt with knew anything about technology either,” Robert said. “So, he was way ahead of the game.”

Gerald recalled: “Everyone looked at me like I was crazy. “Herb (White, who is now The Post’s editor) was the only one that looked at me and was like, ‘OK, we can figure this out.’ So, I showed them how we could lay it out and the whole nine yards. That same week I bought the computers, we put out the first (paper). I was like, ‘OK we can make this work.’”

Almost 40 years later, The Post is the leading source for Black community news in North Carolina, and Gerald isn’t planning on retirement.

“People think I am crazy, but I love working,” he said. “I don’t consider it work because I am passionate about it. I can’t think of what I would do if I retired. I can’t just sit around. I’ve got to have a purpose. I might get sick enough to where I can’t do it anymore but if that doesn’t happen then I will try to keep hanging on. The more we hang on and share with people the vision and they can see it in action, the better off we are.”

The Johnsons feel the need to bring in young people and show them the vision of the company. They both love what they do, but they both realize Father Time is always on time, and when their time comes, the company will be in good hands.

“We’ve got to bring in people, younger people, that have the passion to keep this thing rolling,” Gerald said. “A part of that is having family members involved. It is going to be hard to find another Bonitta (Best, editor of The Triangle Tribune in Durham) or Herb. But we have some family members that can help lead the charge going forward.”  

The Post is still family-oriented with Johnsons on the staff.

“We just have to see what it is going to lead to,” Gerald said.

“Hopefully, everybody that is left sees the vision and it’s our job to make sure they truly understand what is needed to keep this thing going.” As the brothers reflect on the last 50 years, they remember a lot of good times, some hard times, and everything in between.   

“Being able to take a business and grow it is special,” Robert said. “You hear people all the time saying they want to start a business and may start off doing well. But, at some point, they may lose their vision for whatever reason. As long as you have a vision of where you are going in five or six years from today, that is what keeps you going. That is what keeps me going.”

Said Gerald: “For me personally, when I look back on it, the only reason I did this was for (Bill Johnson). I think he would be very proud of what we did. That is pretty much how I look at it. I did it for him and fortunately, it turned out OK so far. I think he would look down and be proud that we did make it and continue to do so.”

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