1930's Business and the Economy | Hammer, Armand 1898-199O

INTERNATIONAL ENTREPRENEUR

Giant.

Armand Hammer was a millionaire for seven of his nine decades, and a most unusual one at that. Physician, pharmacist, mine operator, grain merchant, tractor manufacturer, pencil maker, trader of fine arts and furs, distiller, cattle rancher, oil tycoon—Hammer did many things in his life, all of them with a remarkably deft capacity for negotiation, all of them with unflagging energy, all of them to enormous profit. He was an opportunist, in every dimension, both negative and positive, of that term. He had the capacity to see profits where others saw only loss; he prided himself on doing the impossible; he created a wide network of associates from which to angle every possible gain. He was also ruthless, perhaps unprincipled, constantly fending off lawsuits and indictments. His friends included some of the most important figures of the twentieth century: V. I. Lenin, Eleanor Roosevelt,...