Julius Rosenwald, the president of Sears, Roebuck & Co., partnered with Booker T. Washington to build thousands of schools for Black children in the South. This partnership is cited as the foundation of the Black-Jewish alliance that fueled the civil rights movement. The hosts contrast Washington's "ground-up" approach with W.E.B. Du Bois's "Talented Tenth" theory, suggesting the two were intentionally pitted against each other.