Samuel Curtis Johnson (1928 - 2004)

Business Magnate. Johnson was said to be the richest man in Wisconsin according to Forbes Magazine who estimated his wealth at $7.5 billion. He was the fourth generation to head the 118-year-old former Johnson Wax Company now known as SC Johnson. His vision turned it into four global companies employing more than 28,000 people. Under […]

Robert Wood Johnson, II (1893 - 1968)

Businessman, pharmaceutical magnate, philanthropist. Son of Johnson & Johnson founder Robert Wood Johnson and his second wife, Evangeline Armstrong. He started in the business at the bottom, alongside the common workers. He took over for his father at the age of 16, and took full control of his trust at the age of 25. He […]

John Harold Johnson (1918 - 2005)

Businessman. He was the founder of the Johnson Publishing Company Inc., an international media and cosmetics empire headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, the largest black-owned publishing company in the world.  Also the first African American to appear on the Forbes 400 Rich List in 1982 with a fortune estimated at close to $500 million.  John Harold […]

Howard Johnson (1897 - 1972)

Ice Cream and Hotel Magnate. Howard Johnson was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1897. He quit school in the eighth grade to work in his father’s cigar store. Johnson served in World War I as a part of the American Expeditionary Force. Soon after Johnson’s return, his father died, leaving him the business and its […]

George F. Johnson (1857 - 1948)

Industrialist. He was born in Milford, Massachusetts and moved to Binghamton, New York where he became a supervisor in a shoe factory. Later he became superintendent of that company’s new plant in Lestershire, New York which was said to be the largest factory of its kind in the entire world. He became co-owner of the […]

Eunice Walker Johnson (1916 - 2010)

Business Magnate. Founder, Director and Producer, Ebony Fashion Fair; Secretary-Treasurer, Johnson Publishing Company, Inc.; Co-Creator, Fashion Fair Cosmetics; Widow of John H. Johnson, Founder of Johnson Publishing Company, Inc. which is the largest African-American owned publishing company in the United States. She is credited with naming the company’s premier magazine, EBONY, which along with Jet […]

Eldridge Reeves Johnson (1867 - 1945)

Inventor and Businessman. Invented a spring-driven motor for phonographs, replacing the old hand-cranked method. Manufactured and sold his own phonographs, and created the Victor Talking Machine Company. The company’s trademark – a dog seated before a phonograph – became internationally famous. Johnson sold his company to RCA in 1927. To this day the company is […]

Edward Mead Johnson (1852 - 1934)

Businessman. He co-founded the “Johnson and Johnson” Company with his brother James Woods Johnson, later joining them was their brother Robert. Together they made names like “Bandaid” bandages, “Enfamil” baby formula, and sterile gauze bandages household names. Today, “Mead Johnson,” named after E. Mead Johnson, is located in Evansville Indiana. Other products to their credit […]

Roger Wolcott Jessup (1889 - 1971)

Business Magnate. Owner of Jessup Farms (a milk dairy). Member of the County of Los Angeles Board of Supervisors. A park in Pacoima in the San Fernando Valley is named for him. (bio by: Theologianthespian)  Family links:  Spouse:  Marguerite Edith Rice Jessup (1889 – 1973)*  Children:  Lois Jane Jessup (1927 – 1930)* *Calculated relationship

Emil Jellinek-Mercedes (1853 - 1918)

Besides being vice-consul of Austria in Nice, France, he was a businessman and pioneer in the car-business. He was an agent of Daimler in Nice and had many ideas about specifications that would make the cars sell. He also took part in races with the cars from Daimler. He gave the cars the name of […]

Jacob Christian Jacobsen (1811 - 1887)

Industrialist. In 1835 he took over his father’s brewery and introduced German methods of brewing of beer using pure cultivated yeast. In 1846 he began the construction of the Carlsberg Breweries, named after his son Carl. In 1876 he founded the world famous Carlsberg Laboratory, which has played an important role in the development of […]

Joseph Jacobs (1859 - 1929)

Businessman. A pharmacist, he first introduced what was to be known as “Coca-Cola” to the drinking public on May 8, 1886. It had been invented in 1885 by John S. Pemberton.

David H. Jacobs (1921 - 1992)

Real estate developer and former co-owner of the Cleveland Indians. (bio by: Joyce)  Family links:  Spouse:  Barbara Mae Barrow Jacobs (1926 – 2005)* *Calculated relationship

Robert Jacob (1970 - 1970)

In 1870, Jacob purchased Charles Fritz’s interest in the firm of Fritz & Wainwright, a lager beer manufacturing company in St. Louis. The firm name was changed to Samuel Wainwright & Co. Wainwright’s son Ellis purchased Jacob’s interest in the business in 1875. It was sold to the St. Louis Brewing Association in 1889. (bio […]

David Jacks (1822 - 1909)

Founder of Monterey Jack Cheese.  He was born in Crieff, Perthshire, Scotland.  In 1841 he joined his two older brothers in America.  He then immigrated to California during the Gold Rush in 1949.He was also a businessman, landowner and developer who acquired thousands of acres in and around Monterey, California.  He owned a dairy that […]

Daniel Cowan Jackling (1869 - 1956)

Industrialist, Mining Executive. A native of Missouri, Jackling was raised by his aunt after having lost both of his parents by the age of two. In 1892 he graduated from the Missouri School of Mines and returned the next year to serve as an assistant professor of Chemistry and Metallurgy. After working as a miner […]

Toshiya Iwasaki (1970 - 1970)

Businessman, Philanthropist. He was the founder of the Asahi Glass company, the first producer of plate glass in Japan and now the largest in the world. (bio by: Warrick L. Barrett)

Kazuo Iwama (1970 - 1982)

Scientist, Businessman. He was a physicist at the Earthquake Research Institute of Tokyo University before he joining Akio Morita, Masaru Ibuka and Akira Higuchi in June 1946 as part of Totsuko, which would eventually develop into what is now the Sony Corporation. Iwama became Morita’s brother-in-law and celebrated his wedding ceremony soon after Totsuko was […]

Marcia Israel-Curley (1920 - 2004)

Designer, Entrepeneur and Philantropist. Born Marcia Satz, she and her sisters and mother lost the family farm in Upstate New York during the Depression after her father abandoned the family. The women moved to New York’s Lower East Side, where they all worked to help pay the rent. After high school, she took a job […]

J. Bruce Ismay (1862 - 1937)

J. BRUCE ISMAY Joseph Bruce Ismay was born in Liverpool, the eldest son of Thomas Henry Ismay, the owner of the White Star steamship company. He was educated at Elstree and Harrow. In 1888, he married Julia Florence Schieffelin of New York, the heiress to a pharmaceutical fortune. Upon the death of his father in […]

Taizo Ishizaka (1886 - 1975)

Business leader during the era of tremendous economic growth in Japan. He served as the president of the Dai-Ichi Mutual Life Insurance Company and the Toshiba Corporation. He was also the first president of the Japan Productivity Promotion Association and was president of the Japan Federation of Economics. He is the subject of a book, […]

Ichiro Ishikawa (1970 - 1970)

Industrialist. Ishikawa served as the first chairman of the Japan Science and Technology Union Foundation, and contributed greatly to Japan’s industrial development. In his honor, the Ishikawa Prize was established in 1970 and is awarded to enterprises and persons that develop original methods or systems which meet the needs of the times and achieve remarkable […]

Robert Irsay (1923 - 1997)

Businessman. He developed successful companies in the heating, ventilating, air conditioning, construction and development industries. On July 26, 1972, he traded the Los Angeles Rams NFL franchise, which he had recently acquired from the estate of the late Dan Reeves, for the Baltimore Colts. In 1984, he moved the Colts from Baltimore to Indianapolis.  Family […]

Tetsuzo Inumaru (1970 - 1970)

Having trained in England, France and the United States for the job, Inumaru was the general manager of Tokyo’s Imperial Hotel at the time it first opened to the public on August 31, 1923. (bio by: Warrick L. Barrett)

Junnosuke Inoue (1869 - 1932)

Former president of the Nippon Bank. (bio by: Warrick L. Barrett)

Elwood Ingledue (1899 - 1990)

Author. He began publishing the International Hotel and Travel Index in 1928. Soon afterwards his index listed over 45,000 hotels and travel locations. It became a must have for thousands of world travelers. With the success of the hotel index, Ingledue started publishing the International Golf Index. His indexes are still currently published. He has […]

Charles Henry Ingersoll (1865 - 1948)

Co-founder of the Ingersoll Watch Company, with his brother Robert Ingersoll in 1892. Their company made the ‘Yankee’, a popular, inexpensive watch that sold for a $1.00, a day’s pay at that time. By 1899 they were mass producing 8,000 watches a day. In 1917 they introduced the ‘Reliance’, another popular watch. By the end […]

John Vincent Imbragulio (1927 - 2000)

Businessman. He founded Ace Records, Ace Music Publisher and Avanti Records. Cause of death: heart failure

Hisato Ichimada (1893 - 1984)

Businessman. His efforts were important in helping develop Japan’s economy after the Pacific War, although he mistakenly did not believe that economic development through automobile manufacturing to be beneficial. At the height of his career,Ichimada,a native of Oita, served for over eight years as governor of the Bank of Japan. During that time, he led […]

Morihiro Ichihara (1970 - 1970)

Prominent banker. Also served as mayor of Yokohama. (bio by: Warrick L. Barrett)