Location Ormond Beach, Florida, United States Regions East Coast, Southern US Gender Male
John Davison Rockefeller Sr. was an American oil industry business magnate, industrialist, and philanthropist. He is widely considered the wealthiest American of all time, and the richest person in modern history.
Rockefeller was born into a large family in upstate New York and was shaped by his con man father and religious mother. His family
moved several times before eventually settling in Cleveland, Ohio. Rockefeller became an assistant bookkeeper at the age of 16, and went into a business partnership with Maurice B. Clark and his brothers at 20. After buying them out, he and his brother William founded Rockefeller & Andrews with Samuel Andrews. Instead of drilling for oil, they concentrated on oil refining. In 1867, Henry Flagler entered the partnership. The Rockefeller, Andrews & Flagler company grew by taking-over local refineries. Rockefeller formally founded his most famous company, the Standard Oil Company, Inc., in 1870 as an Ohio partnership with William, Flagler, Andrews, Jabez A. Bostwick, and a silent partner, Stephen V. Harkness. He ran it until 1897.
