Lewis Thompson Preston
 Lewis Thompson Preston    | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Born | August 5, 1926 New York, USA | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | May 4, 1995 (Age 68) Property "Has deathPlace" (as page type) with input value "Washington D.C." contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.[[Washington D.C|Washington D.C.]], USA | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Cause of death | cancer | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alma mater | Harvard | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Parents | • Lewis Thompson Preston Sr. • Priscilla Baldwin | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Children | Lewis Thompson Preston III | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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He was appointed by his friend[1] George H. W. Bush to the President of the World Bank. As of August 2015, he had a spookily short page on Wikipedia - only a couple of sentences.
Contents
Nature
One assessment of him declares that he was a "private and reticent man [who] disliked large formal gatherings."[2]
Family background
A Preston grandfather had been a Confederate officer who later became a partner in John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company. Preston's father was a World War I flier and later a well-known hunter. The world Bank website suggests that in 1948 he was the Captain of the US Olympic Hockey team, and some obituaries mention this, but at least one other source does not name him.[2][3]
Career
US Marines
Preston became a US Marine and reportedly fought in the Pacific during World War II with the 6th Marine Division on Okinawa and with the Ist Marine Division in the occupation of China. He left the service a Sergeant.[4]
Harvard
He graduated from Harvard with a B.A. in history in 1951, where he also played in the varsity hockey team.[5]
J. P. Morgan
Preston began and began as a trainee at J.P. Morgan, when it was only a mid-size bank. [4] He had a 37-40 year career there, becoming a board member. In 1980 he was made chairman and chief executive officer. He stepped down as CEO in 1989, but remained chairman of the executive committee until he left for the World Bank.[2][6] In 1989, the Federal Reserve permitted J.P. Morgan to be the first commercial bank to underwrite a corporate debt offering.[7]
Douglas A. Warner III, J.P. Morgan's chairman, stated that "Lew Preston was the architect of the modern J.P. Morgan and the pre-eminent international banker of his era. He led our firm with penetrating vision, formidable intellect and strength of character."
President of the World Bank
His friend[1] George H. W. Bush appointed him President of the World Bank in September 1991.[6]
Expansion of the World Bank's remit
At the World Bank he declared that "alleviating poverty" would be the Bank's "overarching objective", and said that applications for loans would be judged on a nation's social justice record as well as its economic efficiency. He expanded the role of the bank, beyond that of just making loans, in the direction of organising and implementing projects associated with them.[2]
He removed 240 senior positions from the staff shortly after arriving in 1991, and announced a 6% budget cut in 1994.[8]
Family connections
On April 17, 1959 he married heiress Gladys Pulitzer Preston, granddaughter of Joseph Pulitzer, publisher of The New York World and St. Louis Post Dispatch newspapers and founder of the Pulitzer Prize.[9] His great grandfather was Jerome Preston, businessman.
Deep political connections
He was a member Pilgrims Society[10]. Sources differ on whether he attended the Bilderberg Group, but he has been mentioned as a member and treasurer of Council on Foreign Relations.[11]
References
- ↑ a b http://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/business/1991/03/17/preston-facing-big-job-as-head-of-world-bank/e84da1f8-aff6-4508-a091-71cb0b9b9e7b/
- ↑ a b c d http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTABOUTUS/EXTARCHIVES/0,,contentMDK:20505265~pagePK:36726~piPK:437378~theSitePK:29506,00.html
- ↑ http://www.hockey-reference.com/olympics/teams/USA/1948
- ↑ a b http://archives.sps.edu/common/text.asp?Img=18913&Keyword=&Headline=&Author=&SearchMode=0
- ↑ http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1950/3/29/haa-winter-sports-awards-pletters-and/
- ↑ a b http://www.nytimes.com/1995/05/06/obituaries/lewis-t-preston-68-dies-led-world-bank-into-90-s.html
- ↑ On July 13, 1989 J.P. Morgan & Co. underwrote an offering of 9.20% notes for Xerox Corporation, the first corporate debt offering underwritten by a commercial bank in the United States since 1933.
- ↑ http://universalium.academic.ru/253445/Preston%2C_Lewis_Thompson
- ↑ http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/news/gladys-pulitzer-preston-granddaughter-of-the-found/nMDy8/
- ↑ http://isgp.nl/Pilgrims_Society_members_list_AZ
- ↑ http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/sociopol_globalbanking03.htm
