Veronica Shields-Witter jokes that her first babysitter was the McDonald’s PlayPlace.
She’s visiting the fast-food restaurant at Walters Avenue and Interstate 35, a location that was operated her by dad and mom Katherine and Charles Shields — they had been the primary Black McDonald’s franchisees in San Antonio.
Though the situation has gone by means of a number of facelifts because it first opened its doorways in 1981, Shields-Witter mentioned she nonetheless remembers doing homework at the back of the restaurant, ready for her mother and pa to complete their shifts.
Shields-Witters, 42, is grown with youngsters of her personal and is constant their legacy of working McDonald’s eating places.
Her dad and mom opened their first set of Golden Arches on the Walters Avenue and I-35 location greater than 30 years in the past, then opened a second location on the intersection of New Braunfels and Interstate 10.
However in 1995, when Veronica was solely 13, tragedy struck the household when her father was killed in a automotive accident, leaving her mom to lift her and her 4 siblings whereas additionally working the 2 eating places.
Regardless of the hardship, Katherine Shields went on to open a 3rd location at Farm-to-Market Highway 78 and Foster Highway only a yr later. Veronica Shields-Witter credit her mom’s religion and the East Facet group’s help for her mom’s success.
“My mother prayed whether or not to promote the enterprise or maintain the enterprise, and the Lord mentioned, ‘Maintain the enterprise and maintain transferring ahead,’” Shields-Witter recalled.
Finally, the mother-daughter duo opened extra places throughout town.
Right now, 93% of McDonald’s eating places worldwide are owned and operated by unbiased native enterprise homeowners, with 33% of U.S. franchisees figuring out as folks of colour, and 12% figuring out as Black as of 2023.
Whereas Katherine Shields went on to promote the unique three places, together with the one at Walters Avenue and I-35, she saved it within the fingers of a trusted good friend and San Antonio entrepreneur Ned Stagg.
The household didn’t promote all their shops — Shields-Witter nonetheless is the proprietor and operator of the Converse and Windcrest places. She is the one black feminine McDonald’s franchisee in San Antonio.
A legacy to hold
In 1980, Katherine and Charles Shields moved to San Antonio with their two oldest youngsters after turning into McDonald’s franchisees and being requested by the Chicago-based firm to open a restaurant on town’s East Facet. Charles had previously been an govt at a State Farm company in Dallas, and Katherine had been working at Xerox.
Born and raised in San Antonio, Shields-Witter mentioned she spent lots of time on the eating places along with her household, enjoying, rising and studying. That’s the place she met trustworthy, longtime workers, like Veronica De La Rosa, who says she’s been working on the Shields’ authentic East Facet location for 10 years.
Talking in Spanish, De La Rosa advised the San Antonio Report she is grateful to the Sheilds’ household for hiring her a decade in the past and altering her life for the higher.
Flipping by means of a small pink photograph ablum Shields-Witter has a dozen comparable tales of workers over time. She notes that it wasn’t unusual for the occasional worker to return keep at their home for a short while, whereas attempting to get again on their toes from robust conditions.
“Individuals come as much as me and so they share tales with me of how [my father] helped them get out of a scenario, or they had been homeless, and he helped co-sign them to get them in an residence, or he bought this constructing and helped rehab it,” Shields-Witter mentioned. “… I’m nonetheless pulling the sheets again on issues that my father did within the East Facet group within the ’80s and the 90s that I knew nothing about nonetheless, nonetheless in 2025, so it’s simply been so impactful.”
After the lack of her father, Shields-Witter recollects attempting to step as much as assist her household run the eating places and to assist out along with her youthful brother, who was solely eight months outdated on the time.
She went on to graduate from Incarnate Phrase Excessive Faculty after which Texas Christian College earlier than going to work in Chicago for the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway, a freight railroad that’s considered one of six North American Class I railroads. She spent 11 years with the BNSF Railway as a frontline supervisor, figuring out within the rail yard earlier than she transitioned into advertising for the corporate, the place she climbed the company ladder till 2015.
However that yr, Shields-Witter mentioned she felt like she was being pulled again towards her calling — the household enterprise. She moved again to San Antonio.
“My coronary heart mentioned, ‘Okay, you’ve acquired all this excellent expertise, you’ve constructed all these nice relationships, however now it’s time to go and do the work that you just had been known as to do,’” she mentioned.
After serving to her mom run a number of places throughout San Antonio till 2021, Katherine Shields retired, promoting a number of of her shops off and giving the remaining two to Veronica to handle.
She famous that many well-known political figures, particularly East Facet champions like Constable Kathryn Brown and Bexar County Commissioner Tommy Calvert (Pct. 4), have handed by means of her McDonald’s shops over the yr, at instances even utilizing the Walters Avenue and I-35 restaurant as a meetup hub to assist plan the annual MLK March — thought-about one of many largest Martin Luther King Jr. marches within the nation.
“I look rather a lot like my father, and I’m my mom’s twin,” she mentioned. “I might simply be within the retailer, or within the fuel station, or wherever, and other people would truly method me and say, ‘You’re Charles Shields’ daughter, you’re Katherine’s daughter’ to today.”
The following chapter
Ned Stagg was on a aircraft to Little Rock, Arkansas, when he learn a copy of Black Enterprise Journal that might change his course in life; the journal included an article about how McDonald’s was the primary franchise alternative for African People. On the time, Stagg was working within the oil and fuel business, however Stagg mentioned he knew he wished to work for himself at some point.
That was about 20 years in the past, setting Stagg on the trail to turning into a franchisee himself. After saving up for greater than a decade, Stagg determined to attend “Hamburger College” — McDonald’s coaching facility positioned in Chicago — the place he realized about managing a restaurant and the corporate’s expectations.
Stagg, who now lives on town’s far Northside close to The Rim and La Cantera, is now the proprietor and operator of about 35 places in San Antonio, together with the three authentic places that had been owned and operated by the Shields household.
He mentioned he couldn’t consider his ears when Katherine reached out to him to let him know she was contemplating retiring and promoting a number of of her properties to him.
“I advised her, ‘No, you may’t do this,’ and we talked for some time, and I believed I’d talked her down,” Stagg mentioned. However he hadn’t. Within the following months, Shields began the method of placing these places underneath Stagg, telling him she trusted him like household.
It’s a legacy Stagg mentioned he tries his greatest to reside as much as. For him, success seems to be like arduous work, a form spirit and work ethic.
“I’m comfortable to know the Shields household,” he mentioned.
