How did you come to represent Tony Thompson and Kwame?
We found each other. He was a friend of a client and he told me about his dream of starting a business. I take credit — and I hope he tells you this — for convincing him to quit his job at Anheuser-Busch and work Kwame Building Group full time. He had an idea of doing Kwame part time. I told him you either believe in your plan or you don’t. Step out and do it. What was your first job out of law school? I was with Chris and Wayman Smith at their law firm, Wilson, Smith & McCullin. We were doing defense work for A-B, and some other big corporations were clients. I got fired by Chris Smith, who became head of the firm. That sounds like a setback. You have no idea. I had just gotten my first apartment. I had bought my first car. It blew me away. I looked in the newspaper for a job and found an opportunity with the St. Louis office of business development, which later became SLDC. I was an administrative assistant to the director of small and minority business development. Eventually I beca
