Arthur George Gaston (July 4, 1892 – January 19, 1996) was an American entrepreneur who established businesses in Birmingham, Alabama.
After earning his certificate from the Tuggle Institute[4] (which only went through the 10th grade),[5] he served in the army in France during World War I and then went to work in the mines run by Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company in Fairfield and Westfield, Alabama.
[4][6] While working in the mines, he hit on the plan of selling lunches to his fellow miners and then branched into loaning money to them at 25% interest.
[9] Smith & Gaston sponsored gospel music programs on local radio stations and launched a quartet of its own.
[9][10] Realizing that there were not enough black people with sufficient training to be able to work in the insurance and funeral industries, in 1939 he and his second wife, Minnie L. Gardner Gaston, established the Booker T. Washington business school.
Other Gaston enterprises included Citizens Federal Savings and Loan Association, the first black-owned financial institution in Birmingham in more than forty years.
Fred Shuttlesworth, proposed to support those students' demands in 1963 by widespread demonstrations,[16] challenging both Birmingham's segregation laws and Local Police Commissioner Bull Connor's authority,[17] Gaston opposed the plan and tried to deflect the campaign from public confrontation into negotiations with white business leaders.
He maintained a public show of support for the campaign and not only took part in the meetings with local business leaders, but insisted that Shuttlesworth be brought in since "he's the man with the marbles".
Gaston issued a press release in response in which he obliquely criticized King by lamenting the lack of communication between white business leaders and "local colored leadership".
[citation needed] That committee had no real power, however, as became clear when the movement encouraged school children to march against segregation on May 2, 1963.
The local police officers and state troopers responded to the crisis and subsequently beat rioters and bystanders.
[30] In 2017, President Barack Obama designated the A.G. Gaston Motel the center of the Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument.