Master of the Big Board

Book excerpt: Jack Massey is one of the unsung heroes of American business. To this day he is the only person ever to take three companies to the New York Stock ExchangeóKentucky Fried Chicken, Hospital Corporation of America, and Winner's Corporation. According to Forbes, he "deserves credit for creating the modern fast-food industry." He should get credit for for-profit hospitals as well. The list of people who claim Massey as a mentor includes one U.S. senator, two former Tennessee governors, and the Wendy's founder Dave Thomas.Incredibly, Massey did all of this after he tried to retire. Massey spent his childhood working in his uncle's drugstore in small-town Georgia. Passing the pharmacy exam and receiving his license at age 19 (two years below the minimum legal age), Massey built up a chain of drugstores in Nashville, which he expanded into a surgical supply business in 1937, and became a bank director and head of Nashville's Baptist Hospital. In 1961 he sold his surgical supply company and retired.