Arlan Hamilton’s Backstage Capital climbed up the investment fund ladder, but when the funds failed to fully materialize? A timely readjustment. Arlan Hamilton, a now-39-year-old Texas gal who in 2014 was on food stamps before coming to California and sleeping on airport floors because she was homeless, starts a venture capital fund and becomes a darling of the boys’ club investment community. But the pause? Mostly having to do with the unspoken narratives about what you believe is likely for a woman — never mind a gay Black woman — to be able to pull off without the pedigree that drives Sand Hill Road success stories. Specifically: a penis. Also, as the cartoon McGruff the Crime Dog sometimes suggests, “if something seems too good to be true, it probably is.” Except in Hamilton’s case, it was true. She was homeless after she arrived to attend a Stanford program for budding venture-minded folks, just a music tour manager from Pearland, Texas, with zilch in the way of money or connections. And if the storyline was that she could not afford a place to live, it was probably just as true that she didn’t have the time to find one, because if Hamilton’s story is about anything, it seems to be about indefatigable will. | 