Reginald Lewis
American businessmanWikipedia
12
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5
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5
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Search complete. 12 mentions across 5 episodes found for "Reginald Lewis".
Sep 29, 2026
Jabari YoungHOST
the one that's helped you maybe in this one as
Warren ThompsonGUEST
a leader? I think was it Reginald Lewis who wrote Why Should White Guys Have All the Fun? That was a good book.
Warren ThompsonGUEST
And Reginald was an inspiration to me.
Jabari YoungHOST
You said no to him.
17 MINS LATER
Jabari YoungHOST
Yeah.
Jabari YoungHOST
Uh, you take me back to that time.
Jabari YoungHOST
Again, we, we mentioned, uh, how Reginald Lewis is one of your mentors.
Jabari YoungHOST
Okay.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
So we're all consumers, right? But don't you dare in your life think I ain't going to try to own something, too.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
I want to play, you know, Reginald Lewis, one of the greatest black men of all time, wrote that book.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
Why should white guys have all the fun? And I'm the same way.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
I'm like, why should white guys have all the power? You deserve some power, too.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
He's a great guy to talk to.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
And his father was like a Wall Street pioneer for Black people.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
His father knew Reginald Lewis, if I'm not mistaken.
Boyce WatkinsHOST
And these were just some Black men that, these were not conquerable men.
Lee JenkinsHOST
a great title.
Lee JenkinsHOST
And the reason I was so excited about it, because when I got in the investment business in 1987, the wealthiest guy, I believe, in the United States at that time was a guy named Reginald Lewis.
Lee JenkinsHOST
And Reginald Lewis was the first African-American to ever head up a billion-dollar corporation, Beatrice TLC.
Lee JenkinsHOST
He bought it with a leveraged buyout.
Lee JenkinsHOST
And, man, I followed this guy's career.
Lee JenkinsHOST
but his company was worth a billion and his net worth might have been close to a half a billion or something like that the guy was incredibly wealthy and kind of an unknown
Cedric NashGUEST
yes
Lee JenkinsHOST
you know uh during the 80s most of the wealthy people who were profiled were athletes and entertainers um and people didn't know about reginald lewis i knew about him And then I heard he was sick, and then I heard he passed away.
John Hope BryantHOST
And everybody would say the Tony Restuccias and the Michael Arrighettis and the Michael Milkens, whoever of this world, they don't care.
John Hope BryantHOST
By the way, Michael Milken backed, people for, people don't know, Michael Milken backed Reginald Lewis.
John Hope BryantHOST
They're the first, really the Martin Luther King Jr. of Wall Street was, was, as, as far as breaking barriers, was Reginald Lewis, who did a billion-dollar deal buying a company in the '80s, and that was backed by the only guy who would give him some money back then, which was, uh, Michael Milken, who I think was at Drexel at the moment.
John Hope BryantHOST
And Tony Restuccia saw talent or something, I don't know.
John Hope BryantHOST
He asked me, he answered for himself.
Melinda EmersonHOST
[laughs]
Clarence WootenGUEST
That's the title of the book, and it was written by an entrepreneur by the name of Reginald F. Lewis, um, who was an African American from Baltimore.
Clarence WootenGUEST
And he's the only person to ever get into Harvard Law School without taking an, the LSAT.
Clarence WootenGUEST
Um, and he used what was called a leverage buyout to buy Beatrice Foods, um, for about $900 million back in the late '80s.