September 27. 2006
Minority & Small Business Week
Page B9
‘Reflections’ Anchors Northeast Marketplace
Going with the flow in a
changing neighborhood
bv
R on W eber
m embers watching her dad re
model homes. As many homes
in those days came with unfin
ished basements, her dad spe
cialized in that area. Her inter
est in the d ec o ra tio n field
com plimented her father's busi
ness. With a college degree in
Interior Design, she w ould trans
form a bare basement or any
other unfinished room in the
house. The end result was an
elegant design that co m p le
mented any part of the home or
upgraded the entire house.
W h ile liv in g in D e tro it,
G loria had tw o brothers and
one sister. H er parents w ere
first g en e ratio n tran sp la n ts
from the South. As a young
girl, she has found m em ories
o f spending her sum m ers with
aunts and uncles in A rkansas
or M ississippi. She and her
siblings w ould ride the train
dow n and then at the end o f
the sum m er her father would
drive dow n from D etroit and
bring them all hom e in the car.
Not one to follow the foot
steps o f traditional mid 2()th cen
tury women, Gloria also spent a
num ber a years working sales
W hen not running one o f her
su cc essfu l b u sin ess, G lo ria
M eM urtry is restless. For many
years she tilled her days off
with jogging. I Ok runs, hiking,
skiing, cam ping and an occa
sional marathon. Today, her fa
vorite hobbies are gardening and
reading. Sheexercises her mind,
just the way she always had
exercised her body. Being trim
and fit both physically and m en
tally is paramount to keep up her
busy schedule.
G row ing up a black child in
m id-20th century D etroit was
not an easy task, especially if
you w ere fem ale. But G loria
took it all in stride. An e x
trem ely in d ep endent young
w om an, she started helping
her father in his construction
business. Later she w ould own
her ow n businesses, an incred
ible acco m p lishm ent for an
A frican-A m erican w om an in
the volatile C ivil R ights Era.
M cM urtry's first successful
enterprise was a home construc
tion business that rem odeled in
teriors. As far back as the post
W orld W ar II period, she re
diversity
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The Portland Observer
endeavors to meet the needs of
our readers and advertisers by
going online.
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—
To contact
for the Mobile Oil in the 1970s
and early 1980s. This was an
extrem ely daunting task f o r a
& On
People o f color
find a political f t
M ark W ashington /T he P ortland O bserver
female during this period, but
was almos, im possible if you
were a black woman. How-
ever, Gloria did not let this ste-
reotyping bother her. She loved
the job and was good at it.
continued
on page BIO
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photo bv
Gloria MeMurtry established the first business in the newly built Walnut Business Center, the former Fred Meyer
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