When I started writing about Africa's corporate history and the individuals who played a role in laying the foundations of the corporate landscape that characterizes contemporary Africa, I was acutely aware of the risks associated with such an enterprise.

How dare a black person glorify the contribution of white people in Africa? I am indeed black and a product of a complex political, economic and social past. There is nothing I can do to change the past. It is easy to ignore the past but what cannot be denied is that the present is a consequence of the actions and choices of those who came before us.

The link between colonialism and African poverty has to be critically examined. The need to educate, empower and enhance driven professionals and entrepreneurs to seize the moment and be builders of a new Africa cannot be overstated.

There is a lot we do not know about our past. Attempts to encourage an enlightening, albeit challenging, discourse of the positive and negative aspects of history as they impact current career progression and business development can't be overstated.

Purposeful professional networking can provide a solution to the age-old dilemma that has faced our generation of businesspersons over the last 54 years of independence. Most of the professionals and entrepreneurs that I have interacted with need a credible, informative, professional development offering. This offering has to start with an acknowledgement that in as much as Africa's past had its negative consequences, a firm business foundation was laid during the colonial era for corporate development that we can build upon.

Our generation of professionals and entrepreneurs need motivation, fresh ideas and help. How can we best help people who do not have money for conferences or time for a retreat to enrich their understanding of what can be possible with determination and hard work? There are many professionals and entrepreneurs who naively believe that they can find salvation in looking at the past and seeking to strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.

My goal has always been to encourage all African professionals to think like "Power Players," to assume leadership roles and become the critical drivers of social and economic change, just like the people who came from all over the world to advance their cause on the back of the abundant resources that God deposited in Africa's belly.

South Africa became a magnet of positive thinkers who impacted their industry and community. The experiences of such individuals can help professional and entrepreneurs gain a strategic and tactical edge in a competitive business market.

The insights I have learned from the choices and actions of Africa's corporate founding fathers have helped boost my understanding of the complexity of building enterprises and the critical importance of networking.

One such individual was Mr. John Hays Hammond born on 31 March 1855 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was a famous mining engineer, diplomat and philanthropist. Before the age of 40 he had already amassed a sizable fortune.

Mr. Hammond was the son of Major Hammond, a West Point graduate who fought in the Mexican War, nephew of the famed Captain John C. Hays of the Texas Rangers, and he was also a descendant of General Hammond of the Revolutionary War.
The family moved to California in 1849 to prospect in the California Gold rush.

He wanted to be a mining engineer and his father sent him to Yale's Sheffield Scientific School where he earned a Bachelor of Philosophy in 1876, and later attended the Royal School of Mines in Freiberg, Germany, 1876-1879, and there he met his wife-to-be, Natalie Harris Lum.

His first job was that of a special expert for the US Geological Survey during 1879 through 1880 in Washington. DC.

In 1881, he returned to California to work for Senator Hearst, the mining magnate and father of William Randolph Hearst.

In 1882, he was sent to Mexico, near Sonora to become superintendent of Minas Neuvas. He had married Natalie Harris two years before, and had a young son, Harris.

His first job was to establish law and order around the mine that he successfully accomplished before sending for his wife.
However, the second day after she and the baby arrived at Guaymans, a revolution broke out. Guerillas attacked and he barricaded his family in a small house and fought off the attacking guerrillas.

After leaving the mine, he penetrated into the Andes prospecting for gold, ran a mine in Idaho through a lawless strike.
From 1884-1893, Hammond worked in San Francisco as a consulting engineer for Union Iron Works, Central Pacific Railway and Southern Pacific Railway.

His introduction to Africa came through Mr. Barney Barnato in 1893 that called him to South Africa to investigate the gold mines there after learning of his great reputation as a mining engineer.

He reported that the deep mines had much more strategic importance than the surface mines that were being worked but the Barnatos were not inclined to take the expensive risk of finding out leading to Hammond resigning.

It was Cecil Rhodes, the risk taker, who snapped Hammond up at a record salary of $100,000 per year and a share in the profits.
In 1893, Hammond left for South Africa to investigate the gold mines in Transvaal for the Barnato Brothers.

In 1894, he joined the British South African Company to work with Cecil Rhodes and opened mines in the Rand, in Mashonaland (territory that became Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe).

In 1895, he was managing Rhodes' property in Transvaal, with headquarters in Johannesburg, South Africa.

An early advocate of deep-level mining, Hammond was given complete charge of Rhodes' gold and diamond mines and made each undertaking a financial success.

While working for Rhodes, he made his worldwide reputation as an engineer. He continued to work for Rhodes until 1899, but the situation in the Transvaal was unbalanced.

The gold rush of the last few years had brought in a considerable foreign population-chiefly British and American.

The foreigners ["Uitlanders"], who were by far the wealthiest part of the community, formed a Reform Committee headed by Colonel Rhodes (brother of Cecil), John Hays Hammond, and a few others.

They demanded a stable constitution, a fair franchise law, an independent judiciary, a better educational system, etc.
The Government under President Kruger made promises but failed to keep them.

A desperate situation arose when Dr. Leander Starr Jameson with 1,500 men, sympathizers with the Reformers, invaded the republic.

The Reform Committee opposed his act, gave him no aid, and surrendered its own arms to save Jameson's life when the Boers had made him and his men captive.

Then the Boer Government, using a list of Reform Committee members furnished by the Committee itself, arrested 64 of the 78 members.

The four leaders including Mr. Hammond were kept for two weeks in a windowless cell, with a dirt floor, 11 ft. by 11 ft.-and overrun with vermin.

The prisoners, most of them elderly men, were the pillars of the community. It was said that the prisoners represented $250,000,000.

Their arrest paralyzed business and even the Y. M. C. A.
After a time their wives were permitted to take them necessaries, such as flea powder.

Mr. Hammond was subsequently sentenced to death. The Reform Committee leaders were released after paying large fines, but like many of the leaders, Hammond left Africa for good. Rhodes paid all fines, amounting to some ₤300,000. Shortly hereafter, Hammond left for England.

In 1900, he returned to the United States, became a close friend of President Taft who appointed him a special U.S. Ambassador whom he had known since his student days at Yale.

Taft then sent him to the coronation of George V in 1911 as a special U.S. Ambassador, and twice sent him to assist Nicolas II of Russia on irrigation and other engineering problems. Hammond, the networker, also befriended Presidents Grant, Hayes, Roosevelt, and Coolidge.

At the same time, he continued to develop mines in Mexico and California and, in 1923, he made another fortune while drilling for oil with the Burnham Exploration Company.

He became a professor of mining engineering at Yale University in 1902 till 1909.

In 1907, Hammond became the first president of the Rocky Mountain Club and he remained present of the club until it disbanded in 1928.

Hammond became chairman the U.S. Coal Commission in 1922 and served till 1923.

His close friendship and long time business associations with Frederick Russell Burnham, whom he had met in Africa, led Hammond to become a wealthy oil man when Burnham Exploration Company struck oil at Dominguez Hill, near Carson, California, in 1923.

During May 1926, an organization called "The Company of Friends of John Hays Hammond" sponsored eleven dinners around the world in honor of Hammond.

Over 10,000 people wrote tributes to Hammond, including Hearst whose father gave him his first job, Woolf Barnato whose father, Barney, took him to South Africa, Sir Lionel Phillips who was condemned to death with him, the Guggenheims who employed him, former President Taft, and President Coolidge.

On 10 May 1926 this unique individual was featured on Time Magazine as "Man of the Year" in recognition of this extraordinary event.

John Hays Hammond died of coronary occlusion on 8 June 1936 at the age of 81 in Gloucester, Massachusetts.
He left an estate estimated at $2.5 million.

The history of Africa would not be complete without including the story of Hammond. He played a critical role in exposing the deep mines of South Africa and in so doing enriched our understanding of the complex geology of the Transvaal. He came to Africa on the invitation of Barney but stayed longer to add value to the mining experience.

As we look back, we can say that if Hammond could strike gold in Africa so can we. Gold attracted Anglo Americans to Africa and it continues to provide a sustainable source of cash flows to our generation and yet many of us have yet to understand that through networking there is nothing that is impossible.

The history of Africa would not be complete if we don't take advantage of the positive contributions made by those individuals whose actions we may not approve of in other realms.

By including white people that have shaped Africa's heritage we would only be shedding light on the important fact that much of Africa's wealth is still in "white" infrastructures.

It is important for the new generation of professionals and entrepreneurs to realize what worked and didn't work.
In the final analysis, how many black businessmen, for instance, could care less about the majority of Africans, no different than the white predecessors who are generally described as racist imperialists?