William Barstow Strong

Having graduated from Bell's Business College in Chicago (1855), he began his career in railroads as a station agent of the Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad. He worked his way through the ranks at several railroads, eventually becoming vice-president of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad. Charged with expanding the railroad, he succeeded so well he was promoted to president in 1881, and built the railroad system to some 7,000 miles, the largest in the country by the time he retired in 1889.