Black History Month: 25 October 2020
Don Barden was born December 20, 1943, in Detroit, Michigan. Instead of continuing with university, he decided to start a business and with just $500 started a record store which did well enough that he put on concerts and founded his own public relations business. A lucrative army contract and subsequent property sale made him rich, which led to him cofounding the Lorain County Times newspaper. In 1993, when Indiana legalised riverboat casinos, he teamed up with President Riverboat Casinos and sold his share of Barden Cablevision to raise $300 million; he used this to open the Majestic Star in 1996. In 2002, after Fitzgerald's casinos filed for bankruptcy, Barden took ownership of them, securing $135 million to his stake. Crucially, one of those was in Las Vegas, making Barden the first black casino owner in Las Vegas. Beyond the worlds of gambling and television Barden was also involved in the development of new technologies, including digital voting machines and video jukeboxes that played music videos. He died on May 19, 2001 of lung cancer.
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