Charles Allen, Jr. (1903-1991)
of 2 East 67th Street, New York City; Founder of Allen & Co., Investment Bank
He left school at 15 to become a runner on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1922, he and his brother, Herbert, founded the small “boutique investment bank” of Allen & Company, New York City, becoming an advisor to the Duke of Windsor while he was Governor of the Bahamas during WWII. Allen & Co. had controlling interests in steel, shipbuilding, chemicals, drugs, insurance and other industries, but it became increasingly heavily involved in the media and entertainment business. In 1956, Allen & Co. acquired a Mexican-based pharmaceutical firm - Syntax - that specialized in making synthetic hormones for birth control from yams. Allen & Co. sold Syntex in 1994 to Roche Holding Ltd. for $5.3 billion. He helped develop the Irvine Ranch in Orange County, California, which became the largest master-planned urban development in the United States. His other ventures included oil and mineral developments in Libya, Algeria, Morocco and Mauritania, as well as gold mines in the Philippines and the Grand Bahama Port Authority in the Bahamas. He was known as the shy "Midas of Wall Street."
