Sylvia Woods, the entrepreneur whose vision and decades of hard work turned her Harlem restaurant into a world renown culinary destination, died on July 19 after a courageous battle with Alzheimer\u2019s.\u00a0 She was born in South Carolina in 1926, and following the death of her father she was raised by her mother and grandmother.\u00a0 At age eleven Sylvia met her future husband, Herbert, while they were working in a bean field; they married in 1944.<\/p>\n
Sylvia got her beautician\u2019s license in South Carolina and opened a farmhouse beauty parlor. \u00a0But her entrepreneurial instinct took her to Harlem, where she worked for several years in Johnson\u2019s Luncheonette on Lenox Avenue and 127th<\/sup> Street.\u00a0 \u00a0Using her own savings and a mortgage on her mother\u2019s house, she bought the restaurant in 1962 and built it into a successful business, Sylvia\u2019s, while her husband supplemented the family income by driving taxis and trucks.\u00a0 Her big break was a favorable 1979 review by New York Magazine <\/strong>critic Pauline Kael, who loved the ribs and hominy grits but allowed \u201cthe neighborhood, alas, is shabby and forlorn, perhaps a bit forbidding.\u201d\u00a0 Sylvia\u2019s became a regular stop on European tourists\u2019 Harlem circuit, along with the Apollo Theatre and the Savoy.\u00a0 Over the years Sylvia and her sons developed ancillary businesses including a catering hall, a national line of Soul Food and two cookbooks.<\/p>\n Sylvia Doesn\u2019t Get all the Credit for Sylvia\u2019s; It Was a Collective Effort<\/strong><\/p>\n We know from President Obama\u2019s teachings that Sylvia didn\u2019t build her business on her own.\u00a0 She was smart, but lots of people in Harlem were smart.\u00a0 She worked hard, but there were a whole bunch of hardworking people in Harlem.\u00a0\u00a0 Much of the credit for her success must go to the people who gave her help — her mother, her husband, the banker who gave her a loan, Mr. Johnson who sold her the restaurant, and Pauline Kael who gave her a favorable review.\u00a0 So clearly Sylvia does not deserve all the credit for her success; it was a collective effort.<\/p>\n And don\u2019t forget government.\u00a0 Her restaurant was located at Lenox Avenue and 127th<\/sup> Street, which Sylvia didn\u2019t build \u2013 the government did.\u00a0 Suburbanites made their way to her restaurant via the George Washington Bridge, Brooklyn Bridge, Holland Tunnel, and Lincoln Tunnel\u2014all government built. \u00a0Foreign tourists came via JFK and LaGuardia airports, which the government built.\u00a0\u00a0 Sylvia advertised on the Internet, which the government invented. \u00a0\u00a0And many of her customers worked for the government.<\/p>\n So Sylvia should not get all that much credit for building a world famous restaurant in a tough uptown neighborhood; it was a collective effort.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sylvia Woods, the entrepreneur whose vision and decades of hard work turned her Harlem restaurant into a world renown culinary destination, died on July 19 after a courageous battle with Alzheimer\u2019s.\u00a0 She was born in South Carolina in 1926, and … Continue reading