Ernest Brown Remembers Architect Kenneth G. Groggs

For Black History Month, Ernest Brown — Lakeside Alliance Principal and President of Brown & Momen, Inc. — reflects on his formative relationship with architect Kenneth G. Groggs, the lead designer of the iconic FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., co-founder of the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA) and the first African American to serve as Illinois State Architect.

A lifelong Chicagoan, I graduated from Dunbar Vocational High School in Bronzeville. My time at Dunbar remains one of the most formative chapters in my life for many reasons, but especially because that’s when Kenneth G. Groggs, FAIA paid my architecture class a visit and changed my career trajectory forever.

I met Mr. Groggs on Career Day in my junior year of high school. He came to speak to my architecture class where a group of about 20 of us had begun exploring what a career in architecture or construction might look like. Some of us knew about the industry, but we had never seen someone like Mr. Groggs, who looked like us, show us what was possible.

Admittedly, I was one of four students sitting in the back of the class that day throwing spitballs during Mr. Groggs’ presentation, hardly listening until someone asked what kind of car he drove. Mr. Groggs pointed to a long, black Mercedes parked outside the window. I wanted to drive a car like that! Seeing the car made us more attentive, and we were impressed and motivated by an African American man talking about the buildings he himself had designed and managed. Those of us who went downtown frequently had been in or seen some of them before.

That summer, I was one of three students Mr. Groggs hired to intern at C.F. Murphy Associates, the City of Chicago’s lead architecture firm where Mr. Groggs served as architect of record. He schooled us on basic business etiquette and dress and encouraged us to soak up every bit of knowledge we could. I spent two summers there, drawing the title blocks for the drawing sheets and later working in the model room.

Before my time at C.F. Murphy Associates, my only job had been working in the produce section of a neighborhood grocery. Wearing a suit and tie every day and being exposed to a professional environment outside my community was a big adjustment, but an even more valuable learning experience. So was meeting other Black architects like Wendell Campbell, another co-founder of the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA), and civic leaders like Rev. Jesse Jackson. But Mr. Groggs’ network did not only include African Americans. He introduced us to German-American architect Helmut Jahn, who designed the State of Illinois Building. Back then, Chicago was so segregated, we wouldn’t have had the opportunity to meet someone like Jahn otherwise.

After I graduated from Dunbar, Mr. Groggs suggested that I apply for college. So I did. I earned a bachelor’s degree in construction management and architecture from the University of Illinois Chicago. He pointed me to the firm where I learned about construction scheduling and claims prevention, which became my expertise, and prepared me to accept a position with Amtrak in Washington, D.C., converting the tracks to Boston into a high-speed rail line.

Mr. Groggs’ influence and guidance has been with me from that first encounter at Dunbar, to my first internship and time in college, all the way to today. Now, when I’m representing one of five firms that make up Lakeside Alliance, builder of the Obama Presidential Center, I know that I could be inspiring the next generation and embodying the importance of people seeing others who look like them doing well.

The greatest lesson Mr. Groggs taught me was to give back. I go back to Dunbar to do what Mr. Groggs did for me: open windows of opportunity, demonstrate what is possible and, hopefully, change a life.

Another lesson I took from him is the art of capturing attention. Whereas Mr. Groggs had his Mercedes, I opt to show students a picture of myself after graduation with a big Afro. They laugh, especially since I don’t have much hair now. Then I show them a picture of a $1.4 million check I received for a project. I tell them, “This is the kind of money you can make as a construction professional.” That’s when their eyes get big.