A proposed $75 million International African American Museum in Charleston, SC, has gotten the boost of a new billionaire board member.

Sheila Johnson, billionaire CEO of Salamander Hotels & Resorts and owner of three professional sports teams, has agreed to join the museum’s board of directors.

The museum is planned on the site of a former wharf in Charleston's Historic District where tens of thousands of slaves first set foot in North America.

The concept calls for one side of the 42,000-square-foot museum to have large windows looking out on the water where slaves arrived in the holds of ships.

Some $19 million is needed to start construction early next year. The museum is scheduled to open by the end of 2019.