T. Dallas Smith and Kiplyn Primus

[00:06] KIPLYN PRIMUS: I'm Kiplyn Primus. I am 61 years old. Today is Saturday, December 3, 2022. We are at StoryCorps Atlanta. I am talking to T. Dallas Smith, and he is one of my colleagues from the Atlanta Business League.

[00:21] T. DALLAS SMITH: Yes, I'm T. Dallas Smith, 60 years old. Today is Saturday, December 3, 2022. Storycorps Atlanta. And I'm excited to be here with you, Kiplyn

[00:32] KIPLYN PRIMUS: I'm excited that you are here. So we're going to start at the beginning. You said you're Atlanta born, so I.

[00:38] T. DALLAS SMITH: Have to, you know, stealing Raphael Ben Hills line, Atlanta born, Atlanta bred. When I die, be Atlanta bred. Absolutely.

[00:45] KIPLYN PRIMUS: But let's start at the born. Tell me about growing up in Atlanta. Your family, siblings, what that was like for you.

[00:54] T. DALLAS SMITH: Two sisters. The oldest is Vanessa, and the middle was Giselle. They both went to Turner High School. My father was Willie G. Smith, and my mother is Lurline Smith. My dad worked for Lockheed and drove a taxi for Simpson Taxicab Company, which was when it was Simpson street. So we grew up right off Simpson street in Hunter Hill. In fact, I was born not far from that area. People say, were you a grady baby? I was not a grady baby. McClendon Hospital.

[01:26] KIPLYN PRIMUS: McClendon Hospital.

[01:28] T. DALLAS SMITH: Chickamonga was where I was born. And small hotel, not small hospital of maybe eight rooms. I think doctor McLendon delivered me. My mom used to joke, if you had no money, you were born at Grady. If you had a little money, you were born at McClendon. So she'd always hold the fingers in. She had a little money in there, which, you know, wasn't a lot of money, but as a taxicab driver, working for Lockheed was a good job back then. My mother kept kids at the house, so we always had a house full of kids, although my mother was, didn't realize at the time, but my mother was the entrepreneur of the family.

[02:07] KIPLYN PRIMUS: I was just gonna say now to me, the taxi drivers entrepreneur, and your mom keeping kids. So do you think that's where it was born in you, that. That you just always saw entrepreneurship as a resource, as an answer?

[02:21] T. DALLAS SMITH: It was definitely my mother. So my dad leaned more on stability, you know, thus the Lockheed and.

[02:29] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And the side gig.

[02:30] T. DALLAS SMITH: And the side gig. So if it was up to my dad, I'd be working at the post office. Cause I had an offer to get a job at the post office, and I turned it down. He thought I was. Had to be the dumbest person in the world because post office had great benefits, right?

[02:43] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Yeah.

[02:44] T. DALLAS SMITH: Good government job, good government job, good benefits. But my mother, at eight years old, came to me, and my nickname in the neighborhood was Ty. Everybody called me Ty because my first name is Tanalo, which is a very unique name. So that name got butchered my entire life. But she was in the kitchen washing dishes, and she said, ty, you should go ask Mister and Misses Flanagan if you can cut their grass. I'm eight years old. The only question I asked her was, how much should I charge? And I think about that, you know, now as a 60 year old man. I said, that was an entrepreneur. That's the only question I asked. I didn't ask why. No. How much did I charge? And she thought about it. She said, $5. So I ran next door and knocked on that door like their house was on fire. I said, ty, what's going on? I said, mister Flanagan, Miss Flanagan, can I cut your grass? And they said, how much did you charge? I said, $5. I just blurted it out. He reached in his bucket that had. He had a big bucket with all these silver dollars. And he counted me out, five silver dollars. And I remember running back to my mom, like, look, mom, I got, you know, $5. And she said, well, you're going to have to cut the grass now. But I was too little to crank. The more so I couldn't crank, the more so my mom comes out in the moo moo, you know, house, coat, scarf, and. And she cranks the more for me. And, you know, I laugh about it now. I was going to get the job done, so I finished cutting the grass. But I knew this wasn't sustainable. So my cousin was just a year older than me and taller. His name's Eric Nelson. Eric could cut. He could crank the grass.

[04:23] KIPLYN PRIMUS: He could crank the moor.

[04:24] T. DALLAS SMITH: So I called him with a proposition. I said, man, you know, I've got a customer to cut grass, but I can't crank. The more I said, if you can crank, the more we can split the money 50 50. He said, okay. That was the deal for Eric. And we did that. I had that business until I was 21 years old. But that was. The entrepreneur was birthed that day. And that was all Lena Smith.

[04:46] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And so that was it. The $5 in the hand, you know, what was it that made you think, this is my way, I'm gonna.

[04:53] T. DALLAS SMITH: It was, you know, I was just in the kitchen talking to my mom, and, you know, a few minutes later, I've got $5 in my hand. And so that seemed like freedom, that, okay, I can do this task. I remember coming back with a calendar, figuring out all these, all this money I was going to make from cutting this grass. And then my mother came by. She said, well, son, you're not going to be cutting grass every day, and you got to plan on the schedule. It's going to be rain, wintertime.

[05:22] KIPLYN PRIMUS: The grass has to grow.

[05:23] T. DALLAS SMITH: The grass has to grow. So I was kind of getting discouraged about it. She said, well, you can always get more customers. And I was like, ah. So I started asking other people in the neighborhood and they all said yes. And so I was cutting grass. And it was the idea of, for me, it was almost like making money out of nowhere.

[05:45] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Like the money was growing on the grass. Growing in the grass, literally. Yeah.

[05:49] T. DALLAS SMITH: And so that was really appealing to me. But then later I cut grass until I was 21 and my dad would have me. His buddy JB Dodson started a trucking company, Dotson Trucking, and he was the manager for JB. And so the summer he had me work there, right off Murphy Avenue, and my cousin and I would unload these tractor trailers. And he had a company, it was a tire company. I can't remember the name of the tire company, but we had to unload this, track, the trailer, and by the end of the day, you're completely covered in this smut. I mean, I was black as this microphone, right? It's all from head to toe, back sore. I remember going to my dad, I'm maybe ten or eleven. I said, dad, I need to talk with you. He said, what do you need to talk to me about? I said, I'm going to college. I'm going to use my brain. I'm not going to use my back. And he remember laughing about it. He'd go, all right. In his head, like, okay, lesson learned. Because this was not for me. I didn't want back breaking work. I wanted to be able to use my brain.

[06:54] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And so when you made that decision, what was school like for you? What was growing up?

[06:58] T. DALLAS SMITH: Yeah. So Ec Clemens elementary school off Holly Road was just blocks away from the house. I had two older sisters who were pretty girls, so all the big guys always took care of me. Nobody at the time, I didn't get the correlation. I just thought everybody liked me. Later I realized they were just trying to get to my sisters, but I got the benefit of being taken care of. And so I always had a mouthpiece. I was always the smallest guy, but I had the most. I could talk it my way out of anything. I could start a fight. I could get us out of a fight, starting the fight. I mean, I wouldn't have to actually fight, but I had big boys, big friends, who would always. Sean Moore was 6ft tall in 6th grade, and I was always with these guys. And I could, you know, start something, stop something. And I'd also be the one. They'd say, ty, can you go ask the teacher? We can get ten more minutes on recess. And so I'd be the one go, you know, ask miss negotiating. Negotiating, you know, a little bit more time. And they'd give us more time. So I was always. I had the ability to sell. I didn't know that's what that was, but I also realized that's a very powerful tool, regardless of what you're doing in life, is the ability to sell. And it's been a gift of mine, but it's also two groups of salesmen, good and bad. And I always. There's a cartoon that came out I saw in, I want to say, in the AJC years ago, and it was back in the olden days with bow and arrows and spears. And there's a salesman outside trying to sell, doing a battle to the kingdom. He's got a machine gun. And he goes. And so his lieutenants say, hey, there's a salesman out here trying to sell something. The king goes, I don't have time to talk to any silly salesman. I'm trying to win a battle. Now, if that king had stopped and bought the machine guns, he could have won the battle. So that's kind of how I put myself in that framework. If I've got something really good to help you with your business, save you money, that kind of thing, that's really tenant representation and helping companies with their real estate. It's kind of what we do. And that's how I kind of envision ourselves. We're the ones bringing your machine guns to your.

[09:15] KIPLYN PRIMUS: To the battle to help you win the battle.

[09:17] T. DALLAS SMITH: Absolutely.

[09:18] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So let's talk college, because uga grad.

[09:22] T. DALLAS SMITH: No, no. Didn't go to Uga. Okay.

[09:24] KIPLYN PRIMUS: You're just a Uga fan.

[09:25] T. DALLAS SMITH: Well, I'm on the board of regents for the state of Georgia.

[09:27] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Okay.

[09:28] T. DALLAS SMITH: And we govern, you know, 26 institutions. But there's no way you can't be a UgA fan in this state, particularly with them winning last year. And hopefully they'll win again today. Cause I'm leaving here today and go to the game, the LSU game, but I went to Tennessee State first.

[09:44] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Okay, so tell me about college.

[09:45] T. DALLAS SMITH: I went to Tennessee State first, and I literally, you know, grew up in west Atlanta. Went to Turner High School my freshman year. Then my family got the bright idea of moving to College park, which I was extremely upset with them because college park in 1976 was completely white. We were the first black family on that street. In fact, the day I. First day I ever dealt with racism was the day we moved to College park. We pull up, you know, empty the moving truck and all that, closing the truck door, turn around. There's a white family across the street, husband, wife, son, daughter, and a dog. And they wait for us to turn around. They have a for sale sign in their hands. They put a for sale sign in the yard, and they stump back into the front door. Now, I'm 14 years old, had never dealt with anything racial. And so I look at my dad, and I go, dad, that's ironic. We're moving in, and they're moving out, and my dad goes, boy, get in the house again. I was naive. It went right over my head. I didn't know what was happening. Later that day, maybe 1015 minutes later, it showed how naive I was. I said, dad, I'm going to ride my bike in the neighborhood. So I ride my bike. I don't even get around the corner really well. And three boys pull up to me in the car. Windows go down, and they yell out, get out of my neighborhood. Inward. And they start throwing cans and rocks at me. And where I was from in Hunter Hill, if a fight was breaking out, it was because you did something to somebody. So my initial thought was, it wasn't me. You know, they think I'm somebody else. You guys got the wrong guy. And then later I realized, no, it was what this is the skin color. And I was just terrified because I knew I couldn't do anything about this. And so I just pedaled home and threw my bike into the carport. And I walk into the house, and it's like a normal Norman Rockwell painting. My sisters are helping my mother with the curtains. My dad's painting in the corner. My mother's the happiest I've ever seen her. In that moment, I felt like I had to swallow this story. I couldn't tell her this story because I was going to ruin her day. And so I describe it as swallowing my first razor blade. That's what it felt like to me. She's like, boy, what's wrong with you? Nothing. What's wrong with me, boy? Nothing. And I never told my mother. My mother passed 2020. I never told that story. My father passed in 2010, never told either one of them a story. In my book, I've got a book that's coming out in April is the first time my sisters have read the story. They had no idea this happened. And I said, I just didn't want to ruin her day because of something that happened to me. Not realizing there was a broader context around this. I'm a 14 year old kid, and thought, I just maybe brought this on to myself. Maybe I shouldn't have been in the neighborhood. Maybe I should just stayed in the house, start figuring out.

[12:51] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Took the blame.

[12:51] T. DALLAS SMITH: Yeah. All these reasons for why this could have happened. Now, as a 60 year old man, I'm very clear what happened now. But at that time, you know, it's a tough pill to swallow.

[13:01] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So what was high school like there? Cause you had been in a completely.

[13:05] T. DALLAS SMITH: Isolated teacher, black doctors, elementary school, all black. And so now I'm at Lake Shore High School. We're less than 5% black folk. And it was that same kind of tension around that, you know, like, why are you here? Kind of thing. And again, I was just. I took it. I was mad at my parents. I wasn't mad at the kids. I was mad at my parents.

[13:30] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Like, why am I mad at high school?

[13:32] T. DALLAS SMITH: I had everything laid out to me. My two big sisters, who all the guys liked. I just said, the road was paid for me. Why am I out here? But one of the best things came to it was I met two young guys who happened to be black, and they were brothers, Stacy and Troy. And they said, hey, man, you know, you should come visit us. I said, sure. So I ended up going over their house maybe a couple days later, and their parent, her mom. Their mom was at the front door. Pat. Pat Owens said, oh, are you Ty? I said, that's the nickname. Yes. They're upstairs. You hear them talking. So I go upstairs, and they're 13 and 14 years old, and they're having a debate. And the debate is, the younger brother's telling the older brother, the younger brother, Troy Givens, and the older brother, Stacey Givens. He's telling him, no, no, no. This is how I'll be able to afford the Porsche 911. So they're having this whole discussion. One's going to be a dentist, the other's going to be a surgeon. And he's talking about how he'll be able to afford. The older brother said, you'll just be in your residency. You won't be able to afford a Porsche. I mean, they're having these discussions now. Mind you, in my neighborhood, we never had these kind of discussions at the same time, I'm looking around that room and it's what we would call now a vision board. One has a vision board of. One's going to be Air Force pilot and a surgeon, the other's going to be a dentist. And he's got a picture of the 911 Porsche. He's got the vision boards on both. They both have more house pendants. And it was just. It hit me because on my wall all I had was a picture of Doctor J and Chaka Khan. So I didn't have this. And I remember leaving. That's a vision. But even, man, you gotta get your stuff together cause these guys are so far ahead of you, you don't. You know. And that's really when I started thinking about school. Cause my parents didn't go to college. And so that just wasn't an expectation. The expectation in my household was when you left, you was gonna go get you a good job and be able to take care of your family. That was it. So that's why I mentioned earlier, if I was able to get a job at a post office, my dad would have been the happiest. And I just remember now, you know, time's going by, it's coming up, it's senior year. My buddy Jacaros Moss. I said, chuck, you going to college? He said, I don't know. Ty, you going? I said, I don't know. I said, this is what we'll do. And you know back then they had a college directory like this big, right?

[15:52] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Yeah.

[15:52] T. DALLAS SMITH: And I said, this is what we're going to do. We're going to go open the book and then we're going to point in that school, we're going to send out an application. If we get accepted, then, God, he meant to go to college. If not, we weren't meant to go. We opened it and it was Tennessee State University in Nashville, Tennessee. I never heard of Tennessee State. Chuck got accepted first. Maybe a week later I got accepted. Then I go tell my dad, hey dad, I'm going to Tennessee State. And he said, what? So that was the first time I had the conversation with him.

[16:22] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So did you know it was HBCU at the time?

[16:24] T. DALLAS SMITH: You didn't even knew nothing about it? I got accepted. I was going to happened to be at a gas station not too far from the neighborhood and this guy had a stick on the back at Tennessee State. I said, hey man, you went to Tennessee State? He said, yeah. I said, you wouldn't happen to live around here and have a yearbook, would you? He said, yeah. So he lived literally, like, around the corner from the gas station. He went in, brought his yearbook out, and I saw all these black folks, and particularly these beautiful majorettes who looked like grown women to me. I was like, oh, my God, that's where I'm going to school. So I got excited then, and then at that point, I knew it was hbcuse and went there. My dad told me, if you do well your freshman year, I'll buy you a car. So all I did was study. Freshman year, I had a 4.0, finished with a 4.0, made up for it the second year because I came back to school with a brand new Fiat x 19 two seater target top. You couldn't tell me nothing.

[17:20] KIPLYN PRIMUS: I know you couldn't.

[17:21] T. DALLAS SMITH: And I made up for what I did the entire year. One semester, I went from a 4.0 to a two eight in one semester.

[17:28] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Oh, my gosh.

[17:29] T. DALLAS SMITH: My sister was working at Georgia State, and Giselle was nicknamed Gigi. I said, gigi. I said, what's the GPA you have to have to transfer? She said, two five. I said, can you send me the paperwork now? And that's how I ended up at Georgia State University. So I ended up finishing from Georgia State in 1986. I was on that six year plan, but I also started my career the same year I came here.

[17:52] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Okay, so now what was that transfer like? Because at this point right now, Georgia State has majority african american students graduating.

[18:02] T. DALLAS SMITH: It was not that. So Georgia State in 1982. So now I'm back home in 1982, predominantly white and predominantly. It was a commuter school, sort of a night school. No dorms, no football team. And it was very clear that they didn't want me there. I mean, it was, again, almost Lakeshore all over again. But I met a professor. Now, mind you, I'm also now in my career in commercial real estate, thanks to Thomas W. Tiff, Thomas Willingham Tiff Junior, who brought me in the real estate business.

[18:37] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So what are you doing for him?

[18:39] T. DALLAS SMITH: He brought me in to be his exclusive marketing person, to lease his properties near the airport. They had about 80 acres. They had about 40,000 square foot of office space, maybe call it 280,000 industrial space, call it 10,000 retail space, and the rest raw land. And he wanted somebody exclusively to represent his properties, and so that's what I was doing.

[19:02] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So that was your day job?

[19:04] T. DALLAS SMITH: That was my day job, and I went to Georgia State at night. And so now I'm in my career. I'm at Georgia State. I'm thinking I don't really need college. I'm not going to go to college. But I'd already registered, and I'd registered for this guy's class, David J. Swartz. He wrote the book the Magic of thinking big. Now, there was two groups who thought if I talked to white students, there were certain people who just thought he was as big as ass. I was. Excuse my French. But that's what they thought he was. If I talked to black students, they thought he was the biggest racist. It was such a dichotomy. Then I meet these group of people who just loved him. He was the man who changed their life. He was that guy. So it was such a different. I said, I gotta go see by myself. So I'm gonna go to this guy's class. Based on how this comes out, we'll determine whether or not I quit school. I was prepared to quit school that night.

[19:51] KIPLYN PRIMUS: You believe in these signs?

[19:53] T. DALLAS SMITH: I'm real big in that. I mean, that's all my mom too. I have become my mom. So this is just how it works. So I go to this class, and it's a lecture hall, about 200. I sat on the front row. I'm in suit and tie. I'm the only black student in the class. In comes doctor Schwartz. He opens the door. He's smoking an unfiltered camel cigarette. He takes his last puff. He puts the cigarette out on the sign that says, do not. No smoking. Says there's no smoking. It had all these little divots where he'd been putting cigarettes out for years, you know? And then he limps up to the front of the class, like, I mean, like lurch, almost like a Herman and monster type walk. And I'm going, okay, this is different. My name is David J. Swartz, with a real smoker's voice. Turns out he smoked five packs of cigarettes a day. Unfiltered camel cigarettes. My name's David J. Swartz, and I am the CEO of this class. And you. He's pointing at the class. You are my employees. I won't pay you with money, but I'm gonna pay you with grades. And so he goes behind, and it's like a two story chart board. He pushes the board to the side, and at the top it says a one president. It had b, ten vice presidents, c, 60 managers. So it went on. And it was like D's were like stock boys, and then F's were janitors. And he's like, this was his fixed budget. There was 200 people in the class. It all, totally.

[21:26] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Everybody was going to have a role.

[21:28] T. DALLAS SMITH: So only one a in the class. So people just started getting up out of class and walking out. At that moment, it was totally different for me. I was totally intrigued. I'd never seen anything like this in my life. And so he's like, all right, you've heard from me. Let's hear from you. And he points at me. So I walk up onto the stage, and he's behind the lectern. I said, excuse me. He didn't move. I said, excuse me, he didn't move. I said, excuse me. He didn't move. So I just nudged him out of the way. And so I go into this thing. My name is T. Dallas Smith. I've just been named marketing director for Atlanta Air Center Realty. I'm in this class because I want to become better at what I do. And I can't remember what else I was really saying. But he starts knocking on his table. Hold on, hold on. What is your name? I said, dallas Smith. He said, smith, you have it. He said, whatever it is, you have it. Years from now, you're going to sit on boards. You're going to do. He starts naming all these things. Now here's this white man in front of these white people. Saying these things about me. The only black person in the room, in the class. And I really felt like he had peeped into my soul. Like the things he had said was saying. Were things that I thought only to my deep, deep self. Had never uttered it to a living soul. And here's this man calling these things out. Needless to say, I was. I was hooked. And he goes, he says, Smith, that's your a. He said, you're the president. He said, you're the president of this class. Class. Your job is to try to take that a from Smith. And that he set this competitive nature, this whole thing up in Georgia state. I took. I took him for every. If he'd have talked basket weaving, I would have taken Doctor Schwartz for basket weaving. And one of my favorite stories is I was late registering one year. And so I could. You know, you're looking through the window in that little door. And I can see there's a white person sitting on the desk. Doctor Swart sitting down. I automatically knew. This is the new president of the class. And by this time I'm in my major. There's a woman by the name of Yolanda Anderson. I can still see her. She was the black woman. Now, in the class, it was two black people in the class. Me and her. And she mouths, are you in this class? And I nodded. She was like. Put her hand to the lip, like, oh, my God. So I walk in now, it's only maybe 40 people in the class now because we're in our major. And so I'm tiptoeing in the back. I said, doctor Schwartz, I apologize. I was late registering. There were some issues and registration, but I got everything straight. I'll go take this seat back here in the back. And Doctor Schwartz, hold on, hold on. He said, how many of you know Smith? So half the class raised her hand. The other half didn't know me. He said, well, Dallas, half the class doesn't know you. Come up here. Come up here. Hey, class, I want you to meet your new president, Dallas Smith. And the guy sitting there on the desk looking like, what the hell? What the hell?

[24:17] KIPLYN PRIMUS: I was supposed to be the president.

[24:19] T. DALLAS SMITH: And he just, hey, yeah, yeah, you just go sit down. He brushed him off, told him to go sit down, and he goes, Dallas, now tell him about yourself. He was that guy. And that's not a day he died. 1989. There's not a day goes by I don't think about David Schwartz. The man changed my life. The magic of thinking big. His book has been pivotal to me in terms of just how you think that. The reality is simply this. If you think you can't do it, is right. If you think you can, you're right. And so I would again, that how it has played out in my life, what I'm doing with T. Dallas Smith and company and these boards I sit on. And it goes back to me thinking about that man. And between my two biggest fans on this planet was Lurleen Smith, my mama, and David J. Swartz.

[25:18] KIPLYN PRIMUS: So real estate, did you fall into that? Is that what you knew you wanted to do? And then once you got into it, why was that your thing?

[25:29] T. DALLAS SMITH: Literally leaving Stacy and Troy's house, trying to figure out what I was going to be when I grew up. I had no. I didn't want to be a doctor, didn't want to be a lawyer. The typical things that I saw. But I knew I wanted to make a lot of money. In 1982, Forbes magazine came out with the richest 400 list. And this is. You can do this now in five minutes, what I'm getting ready to tell you. But it took a month to do what I'm telling you now. I went through every name on that list, all 400. And then I wrote a. I had a sheet for each one. So, Warren Buffett, investor, Omaha Nebraska, his net worth. Donald Trump, real estate guy, New York City. His net worth. T boom Pickens old man. Houston, Texas, his net worth. I did that for everybody. The richest people came down to four things. The richest and pretty much is still the same thing to this day. They do real estate, they do oil, they do investments or they're in technology. I want, as I mentioned before, I'm Atlanta born, Atlanta bred. I want to stay in Atlanta because I'm going to be Atlanta dead. So investments need to take me to New York. Oil would have taken me to Texas. Technology just wasn't my thing. So it left me with this thing called real estate. I didn't want to work on weekends because I didn't want kids in my car. And so I literally, that knocked out residential, and so it left me with this thing called commercial real estate. And that's how I picked commercial real estate. And a buddy of mine by the name of Tom Thompson, well, I'm leaving that critical piece. Michael Hightower was a councilman, and he also worked for Georgia state, also where my sister was working. And they were dating at the time. And the joke is, at the time, I didn't realize Michael was dating everybody's sister. Just happened to be saving the dating. Mine, too, but love you, Michael. In my head, I needed to reach out to the most influential person I knew, and that was Michael Hightower. So I called Mike, if he knew anybody, asked him if he knew anybody. Commercial real estate. He did, a guy named Bill Colmer with Colmer properties. I called Bill. Bill was kind enough to let me, I say, hey, I'm thinking about getting a commercial real estate. Can I come shadow you? He said, it may not be me, but it'll be somebody. And so a guy by the name was Steve Gautney. Steve Gautney was just a broker there at the time. Steve's a big retail developer now. He was kind enough to let me shadow him. So Steve was showing me, hey, I had that listing over there, that disposition. He's using words I never heard before. He said, I'm going to take you to this meeting. Don't say anything. Just after the meeting, you can ask questions in the meeting. He comes in this room. It's him and this other white guy on the other side. It's kind of stoic. You know, it's not warm or fuzzy, and then. But it goes from stoic to warm or fuzzy to shaking hands and smiling. And then we leave. He says, you have any questions, Dallas? I said, well, it looked like it was kind of tough in the beginning, but it seems like you got a deal done. He said, yeah, I got a deal done. I said, I just have one question. How much money are you going to make? He said, he left. He said, dallas, I'll make $30,000 off that transaction. This is 1982 when a median income for a family four was $28,000. And so in my head, what I saw them do, I was like, yeah, I can do that. So he laughed. He said, well, you know, we're a small firm. We don't really have room to bring anybody on, but let me take you to lunch. And while I was at lunch, he introduced me to a guy by the name of Tom Thompson. Tom is the same age as me. He's white. That's important to the story because Mister Tiff's. He ends up meeting Mister Tiff. A couple of days later, Mister Tiff tries to hire him. He says, no, I'm happy where I am, but I know somebody. He said, well, have your friend call me. So Tom calls me and says, thomas Willingham Tiff Junior is looking to hire somebody. I said, tiff, like Tiff Georgia. Like Tiff county. Like Tiff universities. Yeah, that's South Georgia. So as your father mentioned earlier, there's Atlanta, then there's Georgia. I knew that. So he owned the property near the east point area, near the airport. But I knew I had to. I knew I had to prepare for T. Dallas Smith, the resume. I knew I could not have Tennessee State on the resume because it's historically black college. I would leave Georgia State on. I knew I could not have T. Dallas Smith on my resume. I had to have something more than that. And I knew I couldn't have track or basketball. So I had golf, squash, chess team. Now, most of which I was not doing.

[30:08] KIPLYN PRIMUS: No, you didn't lie on your resume?

[30:10] T. DALLAS SMITH: No, no. I call it a prophetic resume. Of all the things, all the things I was gonna be doing in which I've done all those things now. Right? So in my head, this was prophetic. It just hadn't happened yet.

[30:20] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And it would be manifest.

[30:22] T. DALLAS SMITH: It would be manifest. Exactly. And so. But I still had this name issue. And T. Boom picking is one of the names that on that list. I had a t, and I had a Smith, which is pretty generic. I needed something in the middle. When 1982, the hottest tv show around was Dallas. So I simply took T. Dallas Smith, put on his resume. I said, okay, that looks like a six foot two white boy texting with blonde hair and blue eyes and I was creating this character, and then I'm handing the resume. This is back when you had to go to a printer, typesetter, all this stuff. I get that done, and I hand it to my buddy, who's white, Tom Thompson. So Mister Tiff's assumption was his friend would also be white. Tom never told Mister Tiff I was black. He got the resume over to him. He said, man, I'm impressed with your buddy. Have him call me. So now I gotta have a phone call. As we all know, I can't sound like a brother on the phone. So in 1982, code switch is what.

[31:23] KIPLYN PRIMUS: They call it now.

[31:23] T. DALLAS SMITH: It's code switching now, you know, whitewashing, that wasn't it. I didn't even know that was a thing. And this is my. This is the mind of a 19 year old. I never talked to anybody about it. What I'm telling you, I knew this in my heart of hearts, what had to happen. So now I gotta have a phone call, but I can't sound like a black man. So in 1982, the whitest white man in America to me was Johnny Carson. I can't do Johnny now. But at 19, when I called Mister Tiff, Johnny Carson was on the other end of that phone, and it was me. The only thing that was missing was Egg McMahon. That was the only thing that was missing.

[31:58] KIPLYN PRIMUS: He just didn't have the hype man.

[31:59] T. DALLAS SMITH: He didn't have the hype mandae. The only thing I was missing. So he says, I love what I hear. Come on through, let's meet tomorrow. So now I gotta meet him. And I come in, and Susan Christie is sitting at the front. She's the receptionist and the secretary at the time, who later became the president of the company. And still, dear, dear friend of mine love her dearly. But when I come in, she's looking at me like. And she said, can I help you? I said, yes, I'm here to see Mister Tiff. And she said, and you are? I said, I'm Dallas Smith. And her chair literally just went back against the wall. If the wall wasn't there, she would have hit the floor directly. She put her finger up, she backed back, closed the door. So I tell people, I'm not a body language expert, but I knew she was surprised when this happened. And so, you know, she goes back, she comes back out, she said, hands folded like this, Mister Tiff will see you now. And the story goes, she goes back, she told Mister Tiff, Dallas is here, but he's black. And Mister Tiff puts his hands his hands in his hand like this and goes, well, since he's here, I'm coming back, but this will be the shortest interview in the history of mankind, so I'll go back. Mister Tiff is Rhett Butler. From going with the wind. He looks like money. He's generations of money. The company was Piedmont cotton meals. So they come from cotton. I mean, you know, needless to say.

[33:33] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Off the slave trade.

[33:34] T. DALLAS SMITH: Exactly. So it wasn't, it was not anybody who looked like me in that office.

[33:40] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And had probably not been in that.

[33:41] T. DALLAS SMITH: In office, but he was, you know, southern gentleman, very cordial. Dallas shook hands, and as I'm getting ready to sit down, he had an eight by ten black and white picture of Ronald Reagan on his desk. And it was signed to my dear friend Tommy from running. I said, oh, you a Reagan fan? He said, yes, I am. I said, so am I. He goes, huh? So you gotta remember, the first time I could vote was 1980. Doctor Swartz was a big Reagan fan. And so. And I love Swartz, you know, for who he was for me. So Tiff and I end up talking about Reagan for an hour. He happened to have the exact same tennis racket I had, which was by pro kinex, and it was first graphite racket called the black ace. I find that funny to me. Now. It was a $300 racket. We both owned that same racket. We talked about tennis for another hour. So 2 hours go by, and as the story goes, he says, when I left, he said to susan, I'm gonna do something I thought I'd never do. I'm gonna hire that young man Mister tiff brought me in the real estate business. I tell people he was my branch rookie. He put me in the game. We had more than a boss employee relationship. It was more like a father and son. We played tennis on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and we hung out at limelight on Fridays. Cause I was single. He was divorced at this time. So, you know, and it's funny, all the sisters would be like, why is this young guy always with this old white guy? And the white women, like, why is this all white man always with this young black guy? But we had more things in common than things that separated us. And so I tell people I'm very hopeful about humanity because I saw this man's life change. And, you know, considering what he came out of, you have to read the book to find out what he came out of.

[35:26] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Well, honest and truthfully, T. Dallas Smith, the deal is that there are very few black folks in commercial real estate right now.

[35:35] T. DALLAS SMITH: Absolutely.

[35:37] KIPLYN PRIMUS: The Atlanta Business League. How did you come to work with the Atlanta Business League, and what did that mean to you?

[35:45] T. DALLAS SMITH: Herman Russell? So when I left Mister Tiff for Atlanta Air Center, I went to work for Cushman and Wakefield, first black broker they ever hired in 1989. They were owned by the Rockefellers at the time. When I left there, I went to work for Herman Russell. First time I heard of Abl was really from Hermande Herman, Jesse Felker, John Cox were all really strategists for ABl. It was an organization that he really loved. You know, then I find out later that, you know, Booker T. Washington, you know, this 1933 that really started this thing and was really about empowerment and for the entrepreneur and our communities. And that's when it really stood out to me. And then I received small business entrepreneur of the year award a couple years ago from APL, you know, Leona Barnes, Bar Davenport. And, you know, Herman died in 2014. For me, it was just, you know, they have a CEO award over that named after him. It was me feeling back, because all I am is a hell of a good imitator. I see something. I was the kid at eight who would come up to you if you were driving the car that I wanted to drive. I would come up to you and go, can I ask you, how did you get that car? And you told me how you got that car. And that would be planted to me. So Herman Russell created a company, from nothing to growing it, to the largest african american construction company on the planet. And I cold called him when I was at Cushman Wakefield. He called me back in 15 minutes. Didn't know me from Adam. And basically what I told him, I said, mister Russell, you don't know me, and I don't even know what this is about. But I know if I'm going to be successful in this town, I need to know you. And it was really from a cold call in 1989 to when he passed in 2014. I was the only non family pallbearer at his funeral and said, well, how do you go from a cold call to being a pallbearer? Intentionality. I'm very intentional about relationships. That drives everything about me and our firm. What I mentioned earlier, we're talking about, how do I help you bring a machine gun to the fight. That's our task. And so his love for abl became my love for Abl. Just like Doctor Schwartz's love for Ronald Reagan became my love for Ronald Reagan. It's these guys who became these images for me to really look up to, and it has served me well. Doctor Schwartz used to always say, if you want to be a plumber, you hang out with plumbers. If you want to be a doctor, you hang out with doctors, you want to be a lawyer hanging with lawyers. If you want to be wealthy, you hang out with wealthy. And so in order to hang out with wealthy, you got to meet wealthy, you got to know wealthy. And so that's been my mo from day one.

[38:43] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And then starting your own company was the impetus for that. And how did you take that full turn back to being an entrepreneur, back to that little boy getting the five silver dollars?

[38:56] T. DALLAS SMITH: So I tell people I've been in commercial real estate. Now, next year will be 41 years, but I've only been in my calling for the last 16. What do I mean by that? I met a young man by the name of Leonte Benton. He was a sophomore. Same year I got into this business. At sophomore, he was at Morehouse. Wanted to get in commercial real estate. And I've done this to 50 people. People come to me, and they say, dallas, I want to get into commercial real estate. And I always say, well, do you have your license? And they say, no, sir. I said, get your license, and we'll talk. So that's how I got rid of people. So I did Leonte the exact same way. But this kid came back in three weeks with his license, and I'm thinking to myself, what the hell? So now.

[39:32] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And now I gotta talk to you.

[39:34] T. DALLAS SMITH: Well, now his operation, get rid of Leonte, is really what I was trying to do. For literally for two weeks, I'd had him doing everything. Walking my dog, washing my car, all kinds, getting lunch. And then. But through this, all this stuff that was happening, it just hit me like a ton of bricks. Some water was being delivered to the office. I said, leonte, can you put the water up? He said, yes, sir. Everything was, yes, sir. Yes, sir. He's putting the water up, and I have this epiphany. It's like God says, dallas, that was you when you were trying to get into commercial real estate business. But there was nobody who looked like you who could help you. You can help. This kid, unlike anybody else was ever able to help you. And it was literally at that moment, at that time, when I realized why God birthed me, why I was born, why I'm on this planet, is to create opportunities for people who look like me to do the same thing I've done over my years. And so we started with no money, no clients, no nothing to. Now we've grown this company to be the largest black owned tenant rep firm in the country. We've got clients that look they read like the who's who. We did the Microsoft transaction in Atlanta. We brought them to Atlanta with Atlantic station with 523,000 sqft in 2020, doing clients during a pandemic, which was the largest transaction in the United States. So I'm a firm believer in knowing what you are supposed to be doing and what I mean, what you're supposed to be doing. Looking up, getting your lessons from above, getting your message from above. And I was growing up, my mother was always, what God wants me to do is God's telling me to do this. And it used to drive me crazy. I had become a mother. So now it becomes very clear to me when, you know, two weeks into helping this kid, God says, train this man up as a son for when you turn 60, he'll be the one that takes over your company. Well, I turned 60 August 23 of this year. On August 20, we had a baton passing where we named him president of the company. So he's president of the company. I'm still CEO and founder, but I'm really kind of pulling out of the day to day to let him do this thing, fulfilling the thing God told me to do. I'm working on some development things. Egbert Perry, that's my guy.

[41:45] KIPLYN PRIMUS: And he has the huge development out in Doorville.

[41:49] T. DALLAS SMITH: You know, he sold it. Oh, he cashed out. So he's doing well. I mean, he's got. But he's got stuff all over. And so my whole thing now is to bet on the jockey, not the horse. So Egbert is one of my jockeys, a guy named Young Wu out of New York. He's landlord for Google in New York. They rent 1.2 million sqft from him. Alan Morris, who did Star Metals, is another guy, one of my jockeys, who I'm sitting in the passenger seat while they drive while we figure out this next chapter that's going to happen that we're calling TD's investments. Another silo inside the firm couldn't be happier. I'm just grateful Abl is playing that part for me because also I'm meeting black entrepreneurs who have an opportunity to come and speak with me and talk with me, because I realize exposure is everything. Without exposure, it's hard to expire to something that you've never been exposed to. But ABL gives you that platform of meeting entrepreneurs from all over. I mean, you've got, I mean, you think about the new chair now, Ryan, who you know, from the gathering spot, and, you know, Al Edwards, who just came out. Edwards Cirm. I mean, and if you're a young person, you want to surround yourself with these kinds of people. Back to what doctor Schwartz said. You want to be a plumber, hang out with plumbers. You want to be a doctor, hang out with doctors. So that's what I think about with Abl Dallas.

[43:13] KIPLYN PRIMUS: This has been fascinating. I mean, I could talk to you for another hour. I know, but for young entrepreneurs, just that last thing I know, if you want to be that, be it, don't try. If you think you can, you can. But what are those things that you feed to them that was fed to you?

[43:37] T. DALLAS SMITH: Again, I'm not trying to get very religious in that way, but one of the things I do on a regular basis is I. I read proverbs. So today is the third, is the day a third or fourth? The whole week's going by, but I'll read proverbs, the third chapter of proverbs. I do that every day. And what's funny now, at 60, things that I read when I was in my twenties mean something totally different to me. I've always, I have a very unique relationship with Goddesse, and I say that this way. If you have kids, I have three daughters. I have different relationships with each one of them. I love them the same, but they're different. And so what I understand about our father, he comes to us that same way. We're his kids. He deals with me totally different than he deals with you. I mean, that's how he is. And so I've learned to really hear his voice from me in terms of what I'm supposed to do. So I tell people, seek his voice. And this is, I don't care what denomination, what religion you come from, we all can hear God's voice. And I told people this, if you've ever been to a party and all of a sudden you tell you about, hey, man, we need to get out of here, and you get out, and then later you find out somebody got shot, got stabbed, that was God's voice telling you, get the hell out of there.

[44:57] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Okay, you have to listen to your voice.

[44:58] T. DALLAS SMITH: You got a voice.

[44:58] KIPLYN PRIMUS: That voice is there.

[45:00] T. DALLAS SMITH: You know it, we all know it.

[45:01] KIPLYN PRIMUS: We all hear it.

[45:02] T. DALLAS SMITH: We all heard it. Now the question is whether or not you want to really listen to it. And I'm a big believer that if I can hear him directly, which is my life has been nothing but that. We'll be on here another 8 hours. For me to tell you some succinct things that have happened, that is very unexplainable. But for God, but to learn to hear his voice for you and to run your own race, your race is. That's one reason I run outside and I don't run in the gym is because if I run on a treadmill next to you and you're running faster than me, all of a sudden I'm going to crank my machine up because now I'm running against you. When I realize the reality is I got to run my race, you may be much faster than me. I don't need to be doing. I'll die, you know, I hurt myself. But learn to run your race, hear the voice, and run your own race. And so that's why I'm so grateful. I knew I wasn't going to be a doctor. I knew I wasn't going to be a lawyer. That was not for me. This is a 14 year old kid. So I kept seeking it till I could find a thing that was for me. At the time, I didn't realize that was God's voice. I was a kid trying to figure my way out. But I'm here to tell you, as sure as I'm talking to you, God will talk to you. As sure as I'm seeing you, you can hear his voice the same way, and I wouldn't. And if I don't hear anything, I stay still. I've learned to just stay still until I get clear direction. When I get clear direction, I simply go down that route.

[46:39] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Thank you so much. Thank you so, so much.

[46:42] T. DALLAS SMITH: Thank you. This has been awesome and just such a privilege to be a part of this.

[46:47] KIPLYN PRIMUS: Thank you.

[46:47] T. DALLAS SMITH: Thank you.