George Huntington Hartford

George Huntington Hartford headed The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company from 1878 to 1917. During this period, AampP created the concept of the chain grocery store and expanded into the countrys largest retailer. He joined the firm as a clerk in 1861 and quickly assumed managerial responsibilities. When AampPs founder, George Gilman retired in 1878, Hartford entered into a partnership agreement and ran the company until the founders death in 1901. In the settlement of Gilmans estate, Hartford acquired control of the company and ultimately purchased the interests of Gilmans heirs.

George Hartford was born on a farm in Augusta, Maine and started his retail career at agein Boston. By 1861, he lived in Brooklyn, New York where he married Marie Josephine Ludlum . They had three sons and two daughters. While he was known to be a private person, Hartford was elected Mayor of Orange, New Jersey in 1878 and served foryears. Hartford retired from the active management of the business about 1907 or 1908 and turned the firm over to two of his sons, George Ludlum Hartford and John Augustine Hartford . He continued as an advisor while they expanded the firm, becoming the countrys largest retailer by 1915. Hartford died in 1917, aged 84, and was interred at Rosedale Cemetery, in Orange, New Jersey. Hartfords estate was worth 125160million. The press respected that he was a private man, and there were few obituaries about him. To immortalize outstanding American merchants, Joseph Kennedy in 1953 commissioned a bronze bust of George Huntington Hartford, four times life

Source: Wikipedia