The story of John H. and Eunice Johnson’s The Johnson Publishing Company is the stuff of legends. Begun in 1942 in Chicago with a $500 loan secured by John’s mother’s furniture, the company would grow into a publishing juggernaut, that included not just its iconic magazines—Ebony, circulation 1.8 million a month, Jet, circulation 800,000 a week—but books, cosmetics, fashion, television and radio stations. Ebony Magazine chronicled a 70-year period of time when almost no one else was paying attention to African Americans. During that time, it told stories of black struggle; it told the story of the civil rights movement; and it told of a changing America. But Ebony also told inspirational stories of black success, showed the burgeoning arrival of a black middle class, and chronicled black cultural as well. Most important, it was a magazine where black people could see themselves—not just in the articles and photo spreads, but in the advertisements as well. For Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Roger Ross Williams and director Lisa Cortes (All In: The Fight For Democracy), this is hallowed ground. Their Emmy-winning documentary The Apollo was also about an iconic institution—a beacon of black history and culture. And like The Apollo, this documentary will tell not just the story of this iconic beloved institution, but of the history and culture of the people it chronicled.