Once upon a time in Black Entrepreneur History lived an African American man named William E. Matthews who was well known in the Washington DC area as “the Black Jew” because his worth was in the upwards of $100K. He was a venture capitalist, or lender, with his own brokerage business in Washington D.C..
William E. Matthews Early Life
William E. Matthews was born in Baltimore, Maryland in the year of 1849 in a poor family who was able to provide for him a common education before he was able to go to college later. He became a graduate of Howard University, having studied under John Mercer Langston who was the African American cofounder and Dean of the Law School at Howard University, the first president of Virginia State University and the First Black Congressional Representative from Virginia.
When he’d come of age, he visited Boston, Massachusetts, and it was in Boston where his “individuality” attracted the attention of Edward Everett Hale (a white preacher who was for the education of formerly enslaved, as well as their complete emancipation) , James Freeman Clark ( a white clergyman) and more men who assisted him in raising money for the Colored Methodist Church of the South. Later in the state of New York, he gained support from another member of the clergy, a white man named Henry Ward Beecher.
Now, it was after the civil war that he moved to Washington D.C. where he was appointed to a clerkship position in the contract division of the Post-office Department during the early part of Grant’s administration, and he held that position until 1882. He was a lender, and he would lend money to the clerks where he worked, and because he found lending to be lucrative, he went into the brokerage business. It was when he left the post office that he founded his financial broker business at 520 Eight Street.
William E. Matthews Career and Reputation
Williams was well known in the Washington DC area as “the Black Jew” because his worth was in the upwards of $100K. Mr. William E. Matthews and many of the Black American men back then, didn’t simply sit on and collect their money. In fact, they put it to use for their own community.
Matthews assisted with the cofounding and organization and transition of people from slavery to freedom by assisting with the development of schools and work for civil rights. He gave much to the charitable and Black public institutions which were there to support his people, and became known as one of the large givers of the race.
He was a man of high prestige, living in the more fashionable part of the city and recognized as the Ward McAllister of the Washington’s Colored Four Hundred. His house was furnished in luxury, and it was a big deal to have your entire home heated by steam and lit by electricity throughout like William E. Matthews’s home. He even had trained servants and a chef whom he paid extremely well. His chef would provide a menu that would surpass the menus of many of white millionaires in Washington D.C. Not only that, Mr. Matthews dinners were served in courses and everyone envied his vintage wines.
In terms of today’s money, that $100K that Mr. WM E. Matthews was worth back then equates to actually $4 million today, so Mr. Matthews was rolling in the dollars as a financial broker and one of the top leaders in the African American community.
Mr. Matthews was a very vocal fighter against discrimination and injustice, and after visiting Europe, he came back even more outraged at how much better Black American people were treated there than in the country that thousands of Black Americans fought for.
He is quoted in the Fall River Daily Evening News of 1889 (see in the news clipping):
“We are allies at home, foreigners in our native land, denied every protection in the land we gave our blood to preserve. Abroad, a stranger, I enjoyed rights and privileges denied me at home. I thought of this anaomous condition, and after conversation with some of the best trained minds in Europe, I concluded that the time is ripe for a race organization for race unity, protection and the promotion of all interests pertaining to dignity or welfare of our people.“
Yes, Mr. Matthews called for an organization for the advancement of Black people in 1889, just ten years before the NAACP was founded and five years before his death.
The Death of Mr. William E. Matthews
It was at 1920 Eleventh Street, the address of his residence, was where Mr. Matthews took his final breath on May 2, 1894 in the early morning hour of 1:15 am. He passed away of pyemia, which is a blood poisoning (septicemia) caused by the spread in the bloodstream of pus-forming bacteria released from an abscess. He’d had the condition for three weeks.
He left behind a widow and a 13 year old daughter, two brothers and even more relatives who lived where he was born – the city of Baltimore.
Sources:
1.The Washington Post, Thu, May 03, 1894 ·Page 1
2.Fall River Daily Evening News, Thu, Oct 03, 1889 ·Page 3
3.The Times-Picayune, Sun, Jan 21, 1894 ·Page 23
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