Abbott Lawrence Lowell

A. Lawrence Lowell | Harvard President, Philanthropist, Reformer

A. Lawrence Lowell was an American lawyer and educator, president of Harvard University from 1909 to 1933, who led the university in significant academic growth. A member of a prominent Boston family, Lowell was the brother of the astronomer Percival Lowell and of the poet Amy Lowell. He graduated

A. Lawrence Lowell

Arthur Charles Nielsen

A.C. Nielsen | Media Ratings, Advertising Research, Market Analysis

A.C. Nielsen was an American market-research engineer and business executive, best known for the “Nielsen ratings,” which offer a national rating of television viewing. Nielsen’s parents were both accountants, and he acquired mathematical interests at an early age. In 1918 he graduated from the

A.C. Nielsen

Amadeo Peter Giannini

A.P. Giannini | American Banker & Financier

A.P. Giannini was an American banker, founder of the California-based Bank of Italy—later the Bank of America—which, by the 1930s, was the world’s largest commercial bank. He was a major pioneer of branch banking. The son of Italian immigrants, Giannini left school at age 13 to work full-time in

A.P. Giannini

Adolph Zukor | Movie Mogul, Hollywood Studio & Paramount Pictures

Adolph Zukor American entrepreneur who built the powerful Famous Players–Paramount motion-picture studio. Immigrating to the United States at age 15, Zukor entered the penny-arcade business in 1903. Between 1904 and 1912 he and his partner Marcus Loew controlled a chain of theatres; in 1912 he left

Adolph Zukor

Adolphus Busch | German Immigrant, Beer Innovator

Adolphus Busch was a German-born American cofounder, with Eberhard Anheuser, of the firm later to be known as Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., one of the largest breweries in the world. Busch was the youngest of 21 children born to Ulrich Busch, a wealthy dealer in wines and brewer’s supplies.

Adolphus Busch

Charles Ahn

Ahn Cheol-Soo | Biography, People’s Party, & Facts

Ahn Cheol-Soo physician, educator, politician, and computer entrepreneur who founded AhnLab, Inc., South Korea’s largest Internet security firm. He later entered politics, establishing the People’s Party (later reformed as Bareunmirae) and staging several unsuccessful bids for the presidency. Ahn,

Ahn Cheol-Soo, physician, educator, politician, and computer entrepreneur who founded AhnLab, Inc., South Korea’s largest Internet security firm. He later entered politics, establishing the People’s Party and staging several unsuccessful bids for the presidency. Learn more about his life and career.

Ahn Cheol-Soo

Alan Greenspan | Biography & Facts

Alan Greenspan American economist and chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, whose chairmanship (1987–2006) continued through the administrations of four American presidents. At age five Greenspan demonstrated his proficiency in mathematics by reciting baseball batting

Alan Greenspan, American economist who served as head of the Board of Governors of the U.S. Federal Reserve System from 1987 to 2006. He was given a share of the credit for the longest official economic expansion in U.S. history (1991–2000), but his actions contributed to the global financial crisis of 2008.

Alan Greenspan

Aldemir Bendine | Biography & Facts

Aldemir Bendine Brazilian business executive who served as CEO of Banco do Brasil (2009–15) and later of Petrobras (2015–16). Bendine began his association with the government-owned Banco do Brasil in 1978, when he began an internship at that bank at the age of 14. He later earned a bachelor’s

Aldemir Bendine, Brazilian business executive who served as CEO of Banco do Brasil (2009–15) and later of Petrobas (2015–16). In 2018 he was convicted of corruption and money laundering and was sentenced to 11 years in prison. His conviction, however, was overturned in 2019. Learn more about Bendine’s life and career.

Aldemir Bendine

Aldo Manuzio il Giovane

Aldus Manutius the Younger | Renaissance, Humanist & Scholar

Aldus Manutius the Younger was the last member of the Italian family of Manuzio to be active in the famous Aldine Press established by his grandfather Aldus Manutius the Elder. When only 14 years old, Aldus the Younger wrote a work on Latin spelling, “Orthographiae ratio.” While in Venice

Aldus Manutius the Younger

Alexander Majors | American Freight Pioneer & Pony Express Founder

Alexander Majors American businessman and coproprietor of Russell, Majors and Waddell, the most prominent freight, mail, and passenger transportation company in the United States in the mid-19th century. The company founded and operated the Pony Express (1860–61). Majors grew up on the Missouri

Alexander Majors

Alexander Turney Stewart | Fashion Retailer, Department Store & Entrepreneur

Alexander Turney Stewart was an American textile merchant whose dry-goods store grew into a giant wholesale and retail business. Stewart came to New York City from Ireland as an adolescent. He returned to Ireland a few years later to collect an inheritance, which he used to purchase $3,000 in Irish

Alexander Turney Stewart

Alfred Hugenberg | Industrialist, Media Mogul, Nazi Party

Alfred Hugenberg was a German industrialist and political leader. As the head of a huge newspaper and film empire and a prominent member of the conservative German National Peoples’ Party, he exercised a profound influence on German public opinion during the Weimar Republic period (1918–33) and

Alfred Hugenberg

Der Kanonenkönig, The Cannon King

Alfred Krupp | German Industrialist & Arms Manufacturer

Alfred Krupp was a German industrialist noted for his development and worldwide sale of cast-steel cannon and other armaments. Under his direction, the Krupp Works began the manufacture of ordnance (c. 1847). His father, Friedrich Krupp, who had founded the dynasty’s firm in 1811, died in 1826,

Alfred Krupp, portrait by Julius Grün, c. 1880

Alfred Krupp

Alfred Lewis Vail | Inventor, Telegraphy & Morse Code

Alfred Lewis Vail American telegraph pioneer and an associate and financial backer of Samuel F.B. Morse in the experimentation that made the telegraph a commercial reality. Shortly after Vail graduated from the University of the City of New York in 1836, he met Morse and became interested in

Alfred Lewis Vail

Alfred Pritchard Sloan, Jr.

Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. | Automotive Innovator, Business Leader

Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. was an American corporate executive and philanthropist who headed General Motors (GM) as president and chairman for more than a quarter of a century. The son of a coffee and tea importer, he was brought up in Brooklyn, N.Y. After earning a degree in electrical engineering from

Alfred P. Sloan, Jr.

Alfred Whitney Griswold | Yale President, Historian, Scholar

Alfred Whitney Griswold was the president of Yale University from 1950 to 1963 who greatly enhanced the school’s endowment and expanded its educational facilities. Educated at private schools and at Yale (B.A., 1929; Ph.D., 1933), Griswold taught English at Yale for a year and then changed his

Alfred Whitney Griswold

Alfried von Bohlen und Halbach

Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach | German Industrialist, Nazi Collaborator & Nürnberg Tribunal

Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach was a German industrialist, the last member of the Krupp dynasty of munitions manufacturers. Alfried Krupp was the son of Bertha Krupp, the heiress of the Krupp industrial empire, and Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach. Shortly after the outbreak of World War

Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach

Alice Elvira Freeman

Alice Elvira Freeman Palmer | American Educator & Women’s Rights Activist

Alice Elvira Freeman Palmer American educator who exerted a strong and lasting influence on the academic and administrative character of Wellesley (Massachusetts) College during her brief tenure as its president. Alice Freeman had taught herself to read by the time she entered local district school

Alice Elvira Freeman Palmer

Alice Waters | Biography, Restaurant, & Facts

Alice Waters American restaurateur, chef, and food activist who was a leading proponent of the “slow food” movement, which billed itself as the healthy antithesis to fast food. Waters studied French culture at the University of California, Berkeley, receiving a bachelor’s degree in 1967. She

Alice Waters, American restaurateur, chef, and food activist who was a leading proponent of the ‘slow food’ movement, which billed itself as the healthy antithesis to fast food. She also cofounded Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, California. Learn more about Waters’s life and career.

Alice Waters

Alhaji Aliko Dangote

Aliko Dangote | Biography, Businessman, Group, Foundation, & Facts

Aliko Dangote Nigerian businessman and philanthropist who is the founder and CEO of the Dangote Group conglomerate. Dangote, of the Hausa ethnic group, was born to Mariya Sanusi Dantata and Mohammed Dangote. His maternal ancestors were prosperous caravan traders under British colonial rule, and his

Aliko Dangote

Alison Jane Cooper

Alison Cooper | Biography & Facts

Alison Cooper British business executive who was CEO (2010–20) of the multinational Imperial Brands PLC (formerly Imperial Tobacco). Cooper grew up in Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, and earned (1988) a degree in mathematics and statistics from the University of Bristol. Although she initially

Alison Cooper, British business executive who was CEO of the multinational Imperial Brands PLC (formerly Imperial Tobacco) from 2010 to 2020. She was the fifth woman to run a company listed on the U.K.’s benchmark Financial Times Stock Exchange index of 100 stocks. Learn more about Cooper’s life and career.

Alison Cooper

An Wang | Biography & Facts

An Wang Chinese-born American executive and electronics engineer who founded Wang Laboratories. The son of a teacher, Wang earned a bachelor’s degree in science from Chiao-t’ung University in Shanghai in 1940. He immigrated to the United States in 1945 and earned a Ph.D. in applied physics and

An Wang, Chinese-born American executive and electronics engineer who founded Wang Laboratories, a manufacturer of desktop calculators and office computers that was one of the most successful American high-technology companies in the 1970s and early ’80s.

An Wang

Andrea Jung | Avon CEO, Philanthropist & Trailblazer

Andrea Jung Canadian-born American businesswoman who was chairman (2001–12) and CEO (1999–2012) of Avon Products, Inc. She later became president and CEO (2014– ) of Grameen America. Jung moved with her family from Toronto to Wellesley, Massachusetts, when she was a young child. Her father was an

Andrea Jung

Andrew Carnegie | Biography, Company, Steel, Philanthropy, Books, & Facts

Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish-born American industrialist who led the enormous expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century. He was also one of the most important philanthropists of his era. Carnegie’s father, William Carnegie, a handloom weaver, was a Chartist and marcher for

Andrew Carnegie, Scottish-born American industrialist who led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century. He was also one of the most important philanthropists of his era. Learn more about how Carnegie made his fortune and about his vast philanthropic activities.

Andrew Carnegie

Andrew Dickson White | Cornell University, Historian, Diplomat

Andrew Dickson White American educator and diplomat, founder and first president of Cornell University, Ithaca. After graduating from Yale in 1853, White studied in Europe for the next three years, serving also as attaché at the U.S. legation at St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1854–55. He returned to

Andrew Dickson White

Andrew Mason | Biography, Groupon, & Facts

Andrew Mason cofounder of Groupon, a Chicago-based e-commerce company that specializes in providing customers with coupons for discounted products and services from local businesses. Mason grew up in the Pittsburgh suburb of Mount Lebanon. His parents were entrepreneurs: his father was a diamond

Andrew Mason, cofounder of Groupon, a Chicago-based e-commerce company that specializes in providing customers with coupons for discounted products and services from local businesses. He served as its CEO from 2008 to 2013. Learn more about Mason’s life and career.

Andrew Mason

András István Gróf

Andrew S. Grove | Intel co-founder, CEO, entrepreneur

Andrew S. Grove Hungarian-born American businessman who was credited with being the driving force behind the enormous success of semiconductor computer circuit manufacturer Intel Corporation, for which he served as president (1979–97), CEO (1987–98), and chairman (1997–2005). Grove was born into a

Andrew S. Grove

André-Gustave Citroën | Automotive Industry, Automobile Design, French Entrepreneur

André-Gustave Citroën French engineer and industrialist who introduced Henry Ford’s methods of mass production to the European automobile industry. Citroën graduated from the École Polytechnique in 1898 and thereafter worked as an engineer and an industrial designer. In 1908 he helped the Mors

André-Gustave Citroën

Angela Ahrendts | Biography & Facts

Angela Ahrendts American business executive who held high-level positions at a number of fashion companies—notably Burberry Group PLC, where she served as CEO (2006–14)—before becoming vice president of retail and online stores (2014–19) at computer giant Apple Inc. After graduating (1981) from

Angela Ahrendts, American business executive who held high-level positions at a number of fashion companies, notably Burberry Group PLC, where she served as CEO (2006–14). She then was vice president of retail and online stores (2014–19) at computer giant Apple Inc. Learn more about Ahrendts’s life and career.

Angela Ahrendts

Ann Marie Brown

Ann Marie Fudge | American Business Leader, Former CEO of Kraft Foods

Ann Marie Fudge American executive best known for her innovative marketing campaigns at such corporations as General Mills, General Foods USA (GFUSA), and Maxwell House. She attended Simmons College (B.A., 1973) in Boston, where she met Richard Fudge; the couple later married. After graduating with

Ann Marie Fudge

Anne Jemima Clough | Women’s Rights, Education Reform & Suffragist

Anne Jemima Clough was an English educator and feminist who was the first principal of Newnham College, Cambridge. She was the sister of poet Arthur Hugh Clough. Clough, whose father was a cotton merchant, spent many of her early years in Charleston, S.C. She returned with her family to England in

Anne Jemima Clough

Anne Wojcicki | Biography, Facts, & 23andMe

Anne Wojcicki American entrepreneur and cofounder and chief executive officer of the personal genetics company 23andMe. Wojcicki received a B.S. degree (1996) in biology from Yale University. She later worked as a researcher and as an investment analyst. In 2006, while pursuing her interest in the

Anne Wojcicki, American entrepreneur and cofounder and chief executive officer of the personal genetics company 23andMe.

Anne Wojcicki

Annie Elizabeth Fredericka Horniman

Annie Horniman | Theatre Impresario, Arts Patron & Feminist

Annie Horniman was an English theatre manager who pioneered the British repertory movement, influencing 20th-century drama, acting, and production. The heiress of a wealthy tea merchant, Horniman studied at the Slade School of Fine Art (1882–86), but after visiting Germany, where she was impressed

Annie Horniman

Anousheh Ansari | Biography, Spaceflight, & Facts

Anousheh Ansari Iranian-born American businesswoman who was the first female space tourist, the first person of Iranian descent, and the first Muslim woman to go into space. Ansari emigrated from Iran to the United States in 1984 as a teenager. She earned a bachelor’s degree in electronics and

Anousheh Ansari, Iranian-born American businesswoman who was the first female space tourist, the first person of Iranian descent, and the first Muslim woman to go into space. Her family endowed the Ansari X Prize for the first private reusable crewed spacecraft.

Anousheh Ansari

Anthony Joseph Drexel | Financier, Philanthropist & Entrepreneur

Anthony Joseph Drexel was an American banker and philanthropist who founded the Drexel Institute of Technology in Philadelphia. Upon inheriting their father’s banking house of Drexel and Company in Philadelphia, Anthony and his brothers transformed it into an investment-banking concern. In 1871

Anthony Joseph Drexel

Aristotle Socrates Onassis | Greek Shipping Tycoon, Philanthropist

Aristotle Socrates Onassis was a Greek shipping magnate who developed a fleet of supertankers and freighters larger than the navies of many countries. Although originally wealthy tobacco dealers, Onassis’s family lost almost everything when Smyrna (modern İzmir), which had become a Greek city after

Aristotle Socrates Onassis

Arthur Hays Sulzberger | New York Times, Publisher, Journalism

Arthur Hays Sulzberger U.S. newspaper publisher. The son-in-law of Adolph Ochs, he joined the staff of The New York Times after marrying Iphigene Ochs in 1917. He was the paper’s publisher (1935–61), overseeing the extension of its news coverage into more specialized subject areas as well as

Arthur Hays Sulzberger

Punch Sulzberger

Arthur Ochs Sulzberger | Publisher of The New York Times

Arthur Ochs Sulzberger was an American newspaper publisher who led The New York Times through an era in which many innovations in production and editorial management were introduced. Sulzberger was educated at private schools and, after service in the U.S. Marine Corps (1944–46) during World War

Arthur Ochs Sulzberger

Asa Griggs Candler | Coca-Cola Founder, Entrepreneur, Philanthropist

Asa Griggs Candler was a U.S. soft-drink manufacturer who developed Coca-Cola. Born on a farm, Candler studied medicine, became a pharmacist, and developed a prosperous wholesale drug business. In 1887 he purchased the formula for Coca-Cola, then not particularly well-known, from a business

Asa Griggs Candler

Asano Sōichirō | Founder, Industrialist, Entrepreneur

Asano Sōichirō was a Japanese businessman who founded the giant Asano zaibatsu, or industrial combine. The son of a physician, Asano chose a career in business, but his first company failed. In 1871 he became a coal merchant in Tokyo. Five years later he developed methods for utilizing coke, until

Asano Sōichirō

Gussie Busch

August Anheuser Busch, Jr. | Biography, Facts, & Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc.

August Anheuser Busch, Jr. was an American beer baron, president (1946–75) of Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., who built the company into the world’s largest brewery. In 1922 Busch was put to work sweeping floors and cleaning vats at the brewery cofounded by his grandfather Adolphus Busch, but by

August Anheuser Busch, Jr., American beer baron, president (1946–75) of Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc., who built the company into the world’s largest brewery. Busch was also known as a civic leader, having helped revive St. Louis in the 1950s. Learn about his life and achievements in this article.

August Anheuser Busch, Jr.

August Schönberg

August Belmont | Biography & Facts

August Belmont German-born American banker, diplomat, political leader, sportsman, and a patron of the arts who was a defining figure of America’s Gilded Age. At age 14 Belmont entered the banking house of the Rothschilds at Frankfurt am Main, and he later transferred to the Naples office. In 1837

August Belmont, German-born American banker, diplomat, political leader, sportsman, and a patron of the arts who was a defining figure of America’s Gilded Age. He was active in politics, and he helped establish Thoroughbred horse racing in the United States; the Belmont Stakes is named in his honor.

August Belmont

Augustus D. Juilliard | Philanthropist, Arts Patron, Arts Benefactor

Augustus D. Juilliard banker and industrialist who bequeathed the bulk of his multimillion dollar fortune for the advancement of musical education and opera production in the U.S. Born of French parents who emigrated to the U.S., he was raised in Ohio and became a director of several leading

Augustus D. Juilliard

Azim Hasham Premji

Azim Premji | Biography & Facts

Azim Premji Indian business entrepreneur who served as chairman of Wipro Limited, guiding the company through four decades of diversification and growth to emerge as a world leader in the software industry. By the early 21st century, Premji had become one of the world’s wealthiest people. In the

Azim Premji, Indian business entrepreneur who served as chairman of Wipro Limited, guiding the company through four decades of diversification and growth to emerge as a world leader in the software industry. By the early 21st century, Premji had become one of the world’s wealthiest people.

Azim Premji

Lelia McWilliams

A’Lelia Walker | Biography & Facts

A’Lelia Walker was an American businesswoman associated with the Harlem Renaissance as a patron of the arts who provided an intellectual forum for the Black literati of New York City during the 1920s. Walker grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, and attended Knoxville College in Tennessee before going to

A’Lelia Walker

Byron Bancroft Johnson

Ban Johnson | Baseball League, Founding Father, President

Ban Johnson was a U.S. professional baseball administrator and the first president of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs (1900–27). Johnson attended Oberlin and Marietta colleges in Ohio; he also attended law school in Cincinnati but did not finish the course. He became a reporter

Ban Johnson

Barry Diller | Media Mogul & Business Leader

Barry Diller American media executive who served as CEO of numerous companies, most notably Twentieth Century-Fox (1984–92), where he created the Fox Network, and IAC/InterActiveCorp (2003–10), an Internet venture. Diller dropped out of the University of California, Los Angeles, and in 1961 he took

Barry Diller

Benjamin Guggenheim | Biography, Titanic, & Facts

Benjamin Guggenheim American industrialist and the father of Peggy (Marguerite) Guggenheim (1898–1979), an important art collector and patron of Abstract Expressionist artists in New York City. Although Benjamin Guggenheim led the life of a successful business executive, he is remembered primarily

Benjamin Guggenheim

Bennett S. LeBow | American Business Tycoon, Investor & Philanthropist

Bennett S. LeBow American businessman who became the first tobacco executive to publicly admit to the dangers of cigarettes. LeBow received an engineering degree in 1960 from Drexel University in Philadelphia and did postgraduate work at Princeton University. In 1961 he formed a computer company,

Bennett S. LeBow

Bernard Lawrence Madoff

Bernie Madoff | Biography, Ponzi Scheme, & Facts

Bernie Madoff American hedge-fund investment manager and former chairman of the NASDAQ (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations) stock market. He was best known for operating history’s largest Ponzi scheme, a financial swindle in which early investors are repaid with money

Bernie Madoff was an American hedge-fund investment manager and former chairman of the NASDAQ stock market. He was best known for operating history’s largest Ponzi scheme. In 2009 he pled guilty to various charges and was sentenced to 150 years in prison. Learn more about his life and crimes.

Bernie Madoff

Bertil Gotthard Ohlin

Bertil Ohlin | Biography & Theory of International Trade

Bertil Ohlin was a Swedish economist and political leader who is known as the founder of the modern theory of the dynamics of trade. In 1977 he shared the Nobel Prize for Economics with James Meade. Ohlin studied at the University of Lund and at Stockholm University under Eli Heckscher. He

Bertil Ohlin

William Henry Gates III

Bill Gates | Biography, Microsoft, & Facts

Bill Gates is an American computer programmer and entrepreneur who cofounded Microsoft Corporation, the world’s largest personal-computer software company. Gates wrote his first software program at the age of 13. In high school he helped form a group of programmers who computerized their school’s

Bill Gates, the visionary computer programmer and co-founder of Microsoft, revolutionized the technology industry with his innovations and became one of the world’s most influential philanthropists.

Bill Gates

William Alton Carter III

Billy Carter | Brother of President Jimmy Carter, Political Activist

Billy Carter farmer and businessman who rose to national prominence when his older brother, Jimmy, was elected president of the United States in 1976. (Read Britannica’s interview with Jimmy Carter.) A peanut farmer and proprietor( of “Billy Carter’s filling station” in Plains, Georgia, Carter

Billy Carter

Boris Abramovich Berezovsky

Boris Berezovsky | Russian Oligarch, Entrepreneur & Political Exile

Boris Berezovsky Russian entrepreneur who was among Russia’s famed “oligarchs,” the post-Soviet group who made their fortunes in the chaotic last years of the U.S.S.R. and parlayed their wealth into political power in the new, capitalist Russia. Berezovsky was the only son of a nurse and a builder.

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