To former banking executive Charles Stewart, Little Rock will always and forever be home. Stewart was born in Sweet Home and raised in Little Rock at the height of the civil rights movement. Emboldened by the possibilities for change he saw during his youth, he worked his way up the corporate chain at Regions Financial Corp. and eventually became the first Black banking executive in Arkansas. In addition to his successful banking career, Stewart helped integrate women and other minorities into the workforce during his tenure on the Arkansas State Police Commission, and put his efforts toward ending hunger and poverty at Heifer International, where he served as interim CEO from 2009 to 2010. He razzles and dazzles as chairman, CEO and co-founder of the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame, whose philanthropic efforts benefit underserved populations across the state.
Outside of your careers, you’re highly involved in the Little Rock community. How do you view the importance of community involvement for industry leaders such as yourself?
I think the benefits go both ways. It’s certainly something that gives the sense of worth to the time and effort you spend in those endeavors, and many times we have skill sets and knowledge and, hopefully, wisdom that we can bring into those operations to develop it into all that it’s capable of being. I had the early privilege in my career in banking to be appointed by then-Arkansas Gov. David Pryor to the Arkansas [State] Police Commission, and I think I was 27 or 28 years senior, and had the opportunity to go into that environment. I was part of that commission that led the effort for the state police to enter in a consent decree, and as a result of that consent decree, the state police was integrated; it was the advent of women coming into the state police, as well as other minorities. At that time, there were no people who looked like me as troopers and certainly as leadership, so that was something I was very proud of being a part of.
What was it like coming of age at the tail end of the civil rights movement and working your way through the finance industry as a Black man?
It was very compelling, actually. I was working in accounting at the Teletype Corp., which was one of the major industries in Little Rock and Arkansas. In 1971, there was a recession, and I didn’t get laid off, but I did get downgraded; I’d worked my way up to grade 10, but was downgraded to grade 2, not even running the machines but degreasing the parts. I was recently married and glad to have a job, but knew I needed, for myself and my family, something a little more dependable. So I started circulating my resume. … One of the things that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said was this: When the doors of opportunity open, we have to have people who are prepared to step into those doors, be prepared, be effective, and keep those doors open for future generations. I was too newborn to be marching, or an busy part of the demonstrations, but that’s the challenge I saw for my generation as I went into banking and ultimately became the first Black banking executive in the state of Arkansas.
Is the world anything like what you thought it’d be at that age?
I’m a student and observer of history, and I used to wonder as a child why we constantly go through the same challenges over and over again. If you look throughout history, progress is made, but then there comes a point where forces try to reverse that progress, and I assess that it’s probably a 50-year cycle. I saw it when people started challenging affirmative action. If you go back even further, Reconstruction was also put in place to level the playing field. Those movements start to have their desired effect, then people who have had privileges start to try and claw that back. We saw a nation that was not prepared to do what was required to implement Reconstruction, so it couldn’t achieve all it was designed to. … We see today, I think, an effort to turn back the clock in a number of different ways and places, challenging everything from affirmative action to diversity, equity and inclusion, to utilize these phrases and turn what I’d consider to be positive into negatives. It’s a push and pull. I think it was Frederick Douglass who said ‘power concedes nothing without a demand,’ so it’s one of the realities of life in America. It’s never a job that’s finished.
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Life motto: “In all thy ways, acknowledge Him, and he shall guide thy path.” Proverbs 3:6
Favorite Little Rock restaurant: Samantha’s Tap Room & Wood Grill
Role models: Arkansas educators Dr. Morris Holmes and William “Sonny” Walker
Hidden talent: Modeled for Dillard’s and Levi’s International in the 1980s, and did some commercials for General Motors.
