George Thompson took a chance on Rochester. A half century later, he has no regrets.

1968, not unlike 2020, was a year of upheaval in American society. 

The Vietnam War was at its peak. Racial tension was overflowing — underscored by the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in April. Protests and riots raged throughout the year, led by Black Americans searching for a more just society. 

In August of that year, a young engineer named George Thompson left his hometown of St. Louis to come to Rochester, making him one of first Black professionals to take up residence here. As he tells it, though, he originally balked at the idea of moving to the North — until advice from his father, Alexander, convinced him to take the chance.

“He told me, ‘St. Louis is what you know. You have an opportunity to go somewhere new. Why not take the offer, and see what it’s like?’ “

It has been 52 years since George took that crucial piece of advice; and since then, the Thompsons have become pillars of the Rochester community.

George built himself reputation as a consummate professional, leading his employer, IBM, to new heights in the 1990s, before leading the Diversity Council for a decade. He also raised three children, who have led successful lives after excelling athletically — something the elder Thompson did himself as a young man.

Now, as America faces another moment of upheaval, the 79-year-old’s life story — one of hard work, compassion and, inevitably, success — carries as much weight as it ever has. 

Heeding his father’s advice

Born in 1941, Thompson bounced around the South in his childhood and adolescence, primarily staying in and around the St. Louis area. Alexander raised George and his siblings after his wife died when George was 11. He held multiple jobs across St. Louis, leaning on siblings to watch the kids while he worked to pay the bills and scrape by.

Alexander made one thing very clear to George — the ticket out of poverty and to a life of success was through schooling.

“He knew the value of a good education,” said Thompson. “He wanted me and my siblings to go get a good education, to get into a position to take care of a family.”

After spending his last year of high school in Mississippi, Thompson left for Clark College in Atlanta, where he lived with his aunt Alice Coachman Davis — the first Black woman to ever win an Olympic gold medal in track and field. He played basketball for the Panthers and graduated with a bachelor’s in engineering, before spending a few years at home and earning his master’s degree from Washington University in St. Louis. 

Thompson earned that master’s degree in 1967, leading to the job offer from IBM Rochester — at that time, a fledgling facility on the outskirts of town. In hindsight, Thompson says it’s tough to think about what could have happened if he didn’t take his father’s advice — where would he be now?

“As I’ve walked through life, his words always ring true,” says Thompson. “I have a great appreciation for this community. I’m glad I took his advice.” 

'All I knew was that it was going to be cold'

While Thompson says it’s easy to look back on his decision to move now, it wasn’t as easy to feel secure in the moment. 

“It was me, my wife, and nine-month-old Darrell, heading north to Minnesota,” said Thompson. “I had never been to Minnesota. I’d never even heard of Rochester. All I knew was that it was going to be cold.”

Once he arrived, Thompson says he didn’t see another Black person outside of his family for two weeks. It spurred him to form a social club for the Black families in the area, creating connections among people that were otherwise isolated. 

At that time, Rochester’s barbers didn’t know how to cut Black hair. The city’s grocery stores didn’t have the ingredients to make certain dishes. Thompson was the first to speak up and fix those issues — but in his eyes, someone had to be the first to speak up.

“People aren’t just going to know what you need... you have to tell them,” he told me. “I just got involved with getting people things that they needed.”

All while working to set up a social fabric for Black families in Rochester, Thompson settled into his role as an engineer at IBM. He spent 26 years with the company, playing a critical role on the engineering team that developed the AS-400 computer system. His efforts helped IBM Rochester win the 1990 Baldrige National Quality Award for performance excellence. 

Thompson says it was one of his crowning achievements in Rochester, and any IBM employee in 1990 would likely say the same — the award “is to U.S. companies as winning the World Series is to ballplayers, and the Pulitzer Prize is to journalists,” a 1990 IBM magazine reads.

The turn of the decade was a high point for the Thompson family; as George’s team won the Baldrige award, his three children — Darrell, George Jr. and Jennifer — were making names for themselves at John Marshall High School. 

Eldest son Darrell received All-American honors in basketball and football for the Rockets, before setting rushing records at the University of Minnesota and becoming a first-round draft pick of the Green Bay Packers in 1990. George Jr. and Jennifer, were also collegiate athletes, both playing volleyball (George Jr. at Pepperdine, Jennifer at Iowa) through the early 1990s.

All three Thompson children received a college education thanks to their efforts, and George credits the city of Rochester for providing the springboard.

“We’ve benefited from this community a great deal,” he said. “We’ve taken advantage of a good school system here, and I’m incredibly proud of my children and what they’ve done.”  

A voice for equality

While Thompson retired from IBM in 1994, he had no intention to immediately step out of public life.

After watching his children graduate from college, Thompson dedicated much of his time to furthering the ideas of inclusion and equity in Rochester. He served as executive director of the Diversity Council from 1995 to 2005, and was able to attend President Obama’s first inauguration in 2009.

In recent years, George has spent his time watching and mentoring his grandchildren, who have fallen in the same mold of athletic success that the Thompsons are known for. Notably, Darrell’s daughter Dominique was a middle blocker for the 2013 Wisconsin volleyball team that reached the NCAA Final Four — in fact, all four of Darrell’s kids played collegiate athletics.

While the elder Thompson’s days at the helm of the Diversity Council are well behind him, he remains a voice for equality in Rochester. The renewed calls for social justice in 2020, spurred on by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, tap into the same societal problems Thompson witnessed as a child in the South, he says — namely, a lack of understanding and a strained sense of community.

“People don’t protest if there’s no reason to,” said Thompson. “Understanding that there is an issue that needs to be dealt with — you can’t fix the problem until you understand that there is a problem.” 

As Thompson enters his 80th year of life, he says the answer to our society’s problems comes in compassion — simply, to treat people how you wish to be treated. It’s been the mantra of his life, and he says following that mantra has never led him astray.

“We’re all on this earth for a certain period of time. We can make it better, or we can make it worse. I’ve always tried to think, ‘how can I make it better under my watch?’ ”

Isaac Jahns is a Rochester native and a 2019 graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism. He reports on politics, business and music for Med City Beat.

Cover photo: George Thompson in 2020 / William Forsman