Anthony Brooks

But the cable TV industry was in flux and in decline, so that didn't end up working out.

So as Juliana told me, she was in midlife, out of a job, and lost with no idea what to do next.

Classic midlife crisis.

Right there.

And the right there for Juliana was to return to that passion project she started at Brandeis to set up a company that would record and archive oral histories of Black Americans.

So how old was she at this point?

So she's in her late 40s when she makes this big decision.

So the idea was to set up something that she called History Makers.

It's an archive of video histories of Black Americans.

But the plan had a huge flaw.

Juliana had no money to do it.

Her friends, they all thought she was crazy.

Even her parents wondered why a Harvard-trained lawyer would want to pursue this pipe dream.

But she was determined and literally started History Makers with a laptop on her kitchen table.

Fast forward to today, History Makers has recorded thousands of interviews of lots of prominent Black artists, athletes, and public figures.

So here's a brief excerpt that I want to play from my story about History Makers.

The nonprofit has collected masses of documents and recorded thousands of video interviews with the famous and not-so-famous, from black athletes like Ernie Banks.

To Black artists like poet Maya Angelou.

To Black politicians, including a young state senator from Illinois, recorded in 2001.

So Ayesha, seven years after that was recorded, Obama was elected president.