Photo: George Ellis Johnson Sr. founded Johnson Products Company in Chicago, creating products such as Ultra Sheen and Afro Sheen, https://aaregistry.org/story/george-e-johnson-was-a-natural-businessman/
The power of Chicago’s Black millionaires and businesses helped propel Harold Washington to become the city’s first Black mayor in 1983.
Black business owners played a major part in his campaign. Washington’s fundraising chief, for example, was Al Johnson, whose Al Johnson Cadillac was the country’s first Black-owned Cadillac dealership when it opened in 1971.
