Charles C. Lucas III image
Charles C. Lucas III image

Charles C. Lucas III

  • Trustee, 2004–Present
  • Chair, 2022–Present

Charlie Lucas, a Charlotte attorney, serves as Chair of the Board of Trustees of The Duke Endowment. He is a fourth-generation descendant of Benjamin N. Duke, brother of James B. Duke. Mr. Lucas currently serves as CEO of DF Enterprises, LLC. In 2011, Mr. Lucas joined Elevation Securities and VP Research, Inc. and served as General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer until his retirement from those firms in 2022. Prior to this, he was a Partner with The McAulay Firm and also worked at Robinson, Bradshaw & Hinson, P.A., where he specialized in corporate finance, public finance and securities law. He attended Duke University School of Law where he served as Editor-in-Chief of the Alaska Law Review, obtaining his law degree in 1990, and is a member of the North Carolina State Bar. Lucas attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he was a Morehead-Cain Scholar and is a graduate of Woodberry Forest School. Mr. Lucas has served as a Trustee of The Duke Endowment since 2004, as a director of several public and private corporations and as a director and/or trustee on numerous not-for-profit boards, including having served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the UNC School of the Arts, a member of the Board of Visitors of Duke Law School and the Board of Visitors of UNC-Chapel Hill, and a trustee of Woodberry Forest School.