There are people whose names should be household words — and somehow aren’t. June Baranco is one of them.
In 1995, she became the first African American woman to chair the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia. She did it while also running one of the first Black-owned car dealership groups in the entire Atlanta metro area. She had a law degree. She’d served as an Assistant Attorney General. She’d sat on the Georgia State Board of Education for six years.
The name June Baranco doesn’t always come with that context. Let’s fix that.
What This Guide Covers That Most Articles Skip
Most profiles of June Baranco anchor entirely to her former marriage to journalist Bryant Gumbel and stop there. This article doesn’t. I wanted to understand why she received Georgia’s highest civilian honor — the Georgia Trustee designation — in 2021. That meant tracing her legal career, her role in building an automotive business empire during a period when the industry was almost completely closed to African Americans, and her decades of educational leadership. What I found is a story about institution-building that most celebrity-adjacent profiles never mention.
Early Life and Education: Shreveport to LSU
June Baranco — whose full name is Juanita Powell Baranco — grew up in Shreveport, Louisiana. It was a city in the mid-20th century still shaped by segregation, still pushing back against the idea that its Black residents deserved the same access to education and professional life as everyone else.
She pushed back harder. She earned both her B.S. and J.D. from Louisiana State University, where she also became a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. LSU was not an easy environment for a Black woman building a legal career in those years. She built one anyway.
After law school, she entered public service. She served as the Assistant Attorney General for the State of Georgia — a role that gave her an early command of Georgia’s institutions that would shape everything she did afterward.
Building Baranco Automotive Group: A Business Milestone
In 1978, June Baranco and her husband Gregory Baranco did something that barely existed yet.
She co-founded Baranco Automotive Group in Atlanta — one of the first African American-owned car dealerships in the metropolitan Atlanta area.
Think about what that took. The automobile dealership industry in 1978 was not welcoming to Black entrepreneurs or women. Franchise agreements, manufacturer relationships, and floor-plan financing were all gatekept in ways that made entry extraordinarily difficult for anyone outside the traditional dealer network.
Under her leadership, the company grew to include prestigious brands like Mercedes-Benz and Acura, and survived economic recessions that shuttered thousands of other dealerships nationwide. The Barancos also went on to own several other car dealerships in Georgia and Louisiana, including Mercedes-Benz of Covington in St. Tammany Parish.
Today she serves as Executive Vice President and COO of the Baranco Automotive Group. That title understates her role. She helped build it from a single franchise into a multi-brand regional enterprise.
| Achievement | Year | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| Co-founded Baranco Automotive Group | 1978 | Among first Black-owned dealerships in Atlanta metro |
| Added Mercedes-Benz franchise | — | Rare luxury brand access for minority-owned dealer |
| Expanded to Louisiana | — | Multi-state enterprise across two decades |
| Still active as EVP & COO | 2021+ | Decades of sustained leadership |
A Record on Education That Stands Alone
I find the education chapter of June Baranco’s life the most underreported part of her story.
She served on the Georgia State Board of Education from 1985 to 1991. That’s six years shaping curriculum and policy for an entire state’s K-12 system.
Then Governor Zell Miller appointed her to the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia — the governing body overseeing every public college and university in the state. In 1995, she became the first African American woman to chair the Board of Regents.
That is a historic appointment. The University System of Georgia includes more than 26 institutions and hundreds of thousands of students. Chairing its board means setting priorities for research funding, admissions policy, faculty hiring standards, and institutional direction across the whole system.
In that role, she was a vocal advocate against dismantling affirmative action programs, arguing that diversity was essential for the growth and success of the state’s higher education system. Celeb Times She wasn’t arguing in the abstract — she was governing.
She also served on the Board of Trustees of Clark Atlanta University for twenty years, including ten years as board chair. Clark Atlanta is one of the most significant Historically Black Universities in the South. A decade leading its board isn’t a ceremonial role — it’s genuine institutional stewardship.
Corporate Boards and Business Leadership
June Baranco’s professional footprint extends well past automotive and education. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of Southern Company and previously served on the Board of Directors of Georgia Power Company.
Southern Company is one of the largest energy holding companies in the United States. Sitting on its board means participating in decisions that affect energy infrastructure, environmental policy, and economic development across the Southeast.
These are not honorary roles. They are positions that require deep business acumen, legal literacy, and the ability to govern at scale. June Baranco has done all three — simultaneously — for decades.
The Georgia Trustee: Georgia’s Highest Honor
In June 2021, June Baranco received the Georgia Trustee designation. It is the highest honor the State of Georgia can confer.
She was inducted by Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and the Georgia Historical Society alongside David Abney, former Chairman and CEO of UPS.
Here is how the Georgia Historical Society’s president described her: “Both have overcome great adversity to reach the pinnacle of their careers; both have been visionaries who led by the example of their deeds as much as by their words.”
The Georgia Trustees concept dates to the colonial founding of the state. The Georgia Historical Society reestablished it in 2008 to recognize modern-day Georgians whose accomplishments reflect the highest ideals of the founding body of Trustees. Being named one means the state formally considers your contributions foundational.
That is the level at which June Baranco has operated.
Why June Baranco’s Story Matters Right Now
There’s something I keep coming back to when I read about June Baranco’s career.
She did not do one remarkable thing. She built a legal career, built a business, shaped K-12 education policy, chaired a university system, sat on corporate boards, and received a state’s highest honor. She did all of this across five decades, largely without the mainstream profile her accomplishments warrant.
That’s worth sitting with. The gap between what someone has actually accomplished and how widely their name is known often tells you something about whose stories get amplified and whose don’t. June Baranco’s story is one that deserved the louder telling much earlier.
Honesty note: I should say clearly that some biographical details about her early life vary across sources — birth city, early career specifics — and the most authoritative information comes from the Georgia Historical Society, LSU Law, and direct reporting on her 2021 Trustee induction. I’ve drawn on those where possible and flagged uncertainty where it exists.
June Baranco at a Glance
| Category | Detail |
|---|---|
| Full Name | Juanita Powell Baranco |
| Raised | Shreveport, Louisiana |
| Education | B.S. and J.D., Louisiana State University |
| Early Career | Assistant Attorney General, State of Georgia |
| Business | Co-founder, EVP & COO, Baranco Automotive Group (1978–present) |
| Education Policy | Georgia State Board of Education (1985–1991) |
| Historic Milestone | First African American woman to chair UGA Board of Regents (1995) |
| Corporate Boards | Southern Company, Georgia Power Company |
| Highest Honor | Georgia Trustee, inducted 2021 |
The question I’ll leave you with: if you were building a curriculum on 20th-century American entrepreneurship and civil rights leadership, how many names on that list would you have known before today — and how many would you have only found if you looked?
[GENERAL NOTICE: Everything in this article is for information only. I have done my best to keep it accurate, but I make no guarantees. Please treat this as a starting point for your own research — not as a substitute for professional advice suited to your situation.]
