Walker, Solomon W.

Impact on the world

As a teenage grocery delivery boy with only $2.50 toward the required $25 charter fee, Walker founded what became the first insurance provider for African Americans in Georgia, building it into one of the largest employers of Black workers in Augusta before its eventual 1991 merger with Atlanta Life.

Life & background

A Black teenager working as a grocery delivery boy in Augusta, Georgia, Walker repeatedly encountered white insurance salesmen during his rounds and conceived the idea of starting a benevolent aid society for Black residents. Lacking the full $25 charter fee, he recruited his brother Thomas Walker, his cousin Walter Hornsby, and former classmate James C. Collier to help raise the funds, founding the Pilgrim Benevolent Aid Association in 1898 with the help of Reverend Thomas Jefferson Hornsby, who provided his home as the organization's first office. The association grew into Pilgrim Health and Life Insurance Company, the first insurance provider for African Americans in Georgia and one of Augusta's largest Black employers, operating for 93 years until its 1991 merger into Atlanta Life Insurance Company.

Sources

1. New Georgia Encyclopedia (Pilgrim Health and Life Insurance Company); The Augusta Press