Ebony's Man

By Charles P. Alexander

Anyone who is 67 years old and has a personal fortune of more than $150 million has a right to relax. But then, John Johnson is not just anyone. "I run scared," says the wealthiest black businessman in America. "I came from the welfare rolls of Chicago." Still driven by the restless ambition that pulled him out of the ghetto, the chairman of Chicago-based Johnson Publishing, the largest U.S. black-owned company (1984 revenues: $139 million) works twelve-hour days and shows no signs of slacking off. Not content to preside over Ebony and Jet magazines, three radio stations and a thriving cosmetics business, Johnson has launched two new ventures: a syndicated TV show called Ebony/ Jet Showcase! and EM: Ebony Man, which he calls a "fashionable-living magazine for black men."

EM is aimed primarily at the growing ranks of increasingly affluent buppies (black urban professionals). Like a black version of Gentlemen's Quarterly, the inaugural November issue is filled with photos of immaculate male models decked out in silk ties, Shetland-wool blazers and camel-hair overcoats. Mixed in with fashion and grooming tips are articles on health, fitness, personal finance and shopping techniques. Examples from the first issue: "A Guide to Investing in a Leather Couch" and a nutrition column that discusses whether one should "eat three meals or nibble like a bird all day."

With an initial circulation of 200,000, EM is a risky proposition for Johnson, particularly at a time when magazine advertising revenues are sluggish. A rival publication, MBM: Modern Black Man, has a year's head start, and several other magazines aimed at black men have folded in recent years. But no one in the industry is underestimating Johnson, whose 40-year-old Ebony has a circulation of 1.8 million. Says Don Jackson, president of Chicago's Central City Marketing: "Johnson will convince advertisers. I think Ebony Man's going to make it."

The new Ebony/ Jet Showcase!, a half-an-hour weekly magazine show heavy on celebrity interviews, is Johnson's second effort to break into television programming. Briefly in 1982, he produced a similar program called Ebony/ Jet Celebrity Showcase but pulled it off the air because he was dissatisfied with the quality of the guests. This time around he has a blockbuster lineup. Since the show premiered in September on 60 stations, it has featured Sammy Davis Jr., Bill Cosby, Aretha Franklin and Little Richard.

As a young man, Johnson realized that taking risks was the only way to rise above the crowd, especially for a black. In 1939, while still an office boy at Chicago's Supreme Life Insurance Co., he pawned his mother's furniture for $500 and sent letters to 20,000 of the company's customers, inviting them to subscribe to a proposed magazine called Negro Digest. About 3,000 people sent in $2 each, and Johnson was on his way. Negro Digest lasted only twelve years, but a second Johnson magazine, Ebony, quickly became the journal of black America. Packed with news, feature articles and dramatic photography, it chronicled the civil rights movement and was a catalyst for the development of black pride.

Johnson is proof of what an astute businessman with a sense of black pride can accomplish. He dines occasionally at the White House and is an important contributor to such politicians as Chicago Mayor Harold Washington and Illinois Governor James Thompson. Yet Johnson has never been completely comfortable with his success. Says he: "I live with the knowledge that it's possible to fail, and I try so hard that I don't."

He makes his employees try hard too. Johnson has an autocratic management style, and some workers have described Johnson Publishing headquarters on Michigan Avenue as a "plantation." For many years, at 9 a.m., Johnson posted himself near the entrance to watch for tardy staff members. Now a guard does the job. Explains a former employee: "The philosophy behind that attitude was to get away from the stereotype that black people are not on time." Extended coffee breaks, disheveled clothes and unruly Afro haircuts are also serious offenses.

Johnson has no plans to retire, but he is preparing his daughter, Linda Johnson Rice, 27, to take over some day. With a B. A. in journalism from the University of Southern California, Rice is in charge of Ebony/ Jet Showcase! She says she has absorbed her father's management style: "Delegate freely . . . and check on it every chance you get." --By Charles P. Alexander. Reported by Elizabeth Taylor/Chicago

With reporting by Reported by Elizabeth Taylor/Chicago