Gwin, William McKendree (09 October 1805–03 September 1885), politician and entrepreneur, was born in Sumner County, Tennessee, the son of James Gwin, a Methodist minister, and Mary (maiden name probably Adair). He pursued legal studies in Gallatin, Tennessee, and gained admittance to the state bar. Gwin matriculated at Transylvania University in Kentucky in 1825 for the purpose of studying medicine. He received his medical degree on 5 March 1828 and practiced medicine for several years....
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Gwin, William McKendree (1805-1885), politician and entrepreneur
Robert E. May
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Lehman, Herbert Henry (1878-1963), investment banker and politician
Robert P. Ingalls
Lehman, Herbert Henry (28 March 1878–05 December 1963), investment banker and politician, was born in New York City, the son of Mayer Lehman and Babette Newgass, German immigrants. Lehman was reared in the prosperous surroundings of German-Jewish society in midtown Manhattan. His father was a founding partner of Lehman Brothers, a cotton-trading company that developed into a leading investment banking firm....
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Mellon, Andrew William (1855-1937), financier, statesman, and art collector
Robert L. Gale
Mellon, Andrew William (24 March 1855–26 August 1937), financier, statesman, and art collector, was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of Thomas Mellon, a lawyer and later a judge, entrepreneur, and banker, and Sarah Jane Negley. Mellon attended public schools in Pittsburgh and Western University of Pennsylvania (now the University of Pittsburgh). While still a student he observed his father’s financial dealings with industrialists ...
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Otis, Harrison Gray (1765-1848), politician, lawyer, and businessman
Eva Sheppard
Otis, Harrison Gray (08 October 1765–28 October 1848), politician, lawyer, and businessman, was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Samuel Allyne Otis, a merchant and the first secretary of the U.S. Senate, and Elizabeth Gray. “Harry,” as he was called, enjoyed the privileges of economic comfort and social elevation, including his family connection to two famous revolutionary figures: his paternal aunt ...
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Percy, Charles Hartung (27 Sept. 1919–17 Sept. 2011), business executive and politician
Ann T. Keene
Percy, Charles Hartung (27 Sept. 1919–17 Sept. 2011), business executive and politician, was born in Pensacola, Florida, to Edward H. Percy, a bank cashier with distinguished family roots in Alabama and Virginia, and Elizabeth Harting Percy, a concert violinist from Illinois. During young Percy’s infancy the family moved to Chicago, where two more children were born. The Percys led a comfortable life in the 1920s, providing their children with music lessons and other middle-class amenities. By ...
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Perkins, George Walbridge (1862-1920), banker and political leader
John A. Garraty
Perkins, George Walbridge (31 January 1862–18 June 1920), banker and political leader, was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of George W. Perkins, a prison official, and Sarah Louise Mills. In 1872 his father left prison work to run an agency of the New York Life Insurance Company. George had only a grammar school education. In 1877 he began working for his father as an office boy, and by 1886 he had become agency cashier at $100 a month. In that year the elder Perkins died. George hoped to take over the agency, but the company considered him too young for the position and offered him a job as salesman. He accepted reluctantly but was a phenomenal success. Between February 1887 and the end of the year he sold nearly $3 million in policies in Kansas and Colorado. The company then made him district supervisor in charge of business in the Southwest....
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Perot, H. Ross (27 June 1930–9 July 2019), entrepreneur
Alan Deutschman
Perot, H. Ross (27 June 1930–9 July 2019), entrepreneur and political figure, was born Henry Ray Perot in Texarkana, Texas, the third child of Gabriel Ross Perot, a cotton broker, and Lula May Ray, a secretary at a lumber company. When he was twelve his parents legally changed his middle name to Ross in honor of their firstborn son, Gabriel Ross Perot, Jr., who died of spinal meningitis at age three. Despite the family’s French Canadian heritage, they pronounced their name “PEE-roh,” and only as a young man would Perot acquiesce to being called “puh-ROH.”...
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Pinchback, P. B. S. (1837-1921), politician, editor, and entrepreneur
Eric R. Jackson
Pinchback, P. B. S. (10 May 1837–21 December 1921), politician, editor, and entrepreneur, was born Pinckney Benton Stewart Pinchback in Macon, Georgia, the son of William Pinchback, a Mississippi plantation owner, and Eliza Stewart, a former slave of mixed ancestry. Because William Pinchback had taken Eliza to Philadelphia to obtain her emancipation, Pinckney was free upon birth....
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Roosevelt, Elliott (1910-1990), advertising executive, public figure, and author
Robert L. Gale
Roosevelt, Elliott (23 September 1910–27 October 1990), advertising executive, public figure, and author, was born in New York City, the son of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the thirty-second president of the United States, and Eleanor Roosevelt. He attended Groton Academy in Massachusetts (1923–1929) and Hun School in New Jersey (1929–1930). He declined to follow the family tradition and did not go to Harvard but entered the business world instead. He was an advertising account executive in one firm (1930), vice president of another (1931), and then an account executive in yet another (1932). He became aviation editor for the ...
