Black Milepost

Reaching the top in Atlanta

Atlantans rightly pride themselves on their good race relations. Blacks and whites worked together to head off serious racial strife in the 1960s. They avoided further confrontations in the 1970s by compromising on a token voluntary school busing program. For four years Atlanta has had a black mayor, Maynard Jackson. Last week the city passed another milepost, for itself and the South, when Jesse Hill Jr., 51, a black insurance executive, became president of the Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, in effect becoming the titular head of the city's mostly white business establishment.

About the least impressed person in town was Hill. Said he: "It's an honor, but it's not the first time I've had a leadership position that crossed racial lines." He is president of the Atlanta Life Insurance Co., founded by an ex-slave in 1905, and a director of Delta Airlines. In 1974 he became the first black member of the state university system's board of regents. As Chamber president, Hill expects to be little different from his predecessors. "Everything has changed," he says, "but everything is the same. Our main job is still to promote and enhance the economic vitality of Atlanta."

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