Doctor Henry Claude Hudson founded Broadway Federal Savings and Loan in 1946 and, beginning in 1949, served as Chair of the Board of Directors for 23 years. He was a dentist, lawyer and businessman from Marksville, Louisiana. The son of a Louisiana slave, he dedicated his life to civil rights advocacy and was a pioneer of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, serving as the president of the first branch in Shreveport, LA from 1921-1923.
Mr. Hudson had earned his dentistry degree from Howard University in 1913 and eventually settled with his family in Los Angeles, CA. Within a year of relocating, he was elected president of the NAACP’s L.A. branch, earning him the title “Mr. NAACP” from locals, many of whom recognized him as the city’s most respected Black leader.
At the age of 41, he enrolled in Loyola Law School, in the four-year evening program, while actively practicing dentistry. Mr. Hudson was Loyola’s first Black graduate in 1931. Although he never practiced law in the traditional sense, he applied his knowledge to his work with the NAACP and was named to the national Board of Directors in 1953. He was instrumental in desegregating Los Angeles beaches and in establishing the Martin Luther King, Jr. Hospital.
At the time of Broadway Federal’s founding, it was the nation’s second largest Black savings and loan association. In 1976, Mr. Hudson won Los Angeles County’s highest honor, the “Distinguished Service Medal.”