Junior Achievement recognizes Kohler, five other business icons

WISCONSIN’S  Herbert V. Kohler, Jr., chairman and president of the Kohler Company, heads a distinguished list of corporate leaders to be inducted into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in Milwaukee April 27.

Established in 1975, the Hall of Fame has recognized 223 “icons of commerce and industry.” This year’s class will be inducted at a black-tie dinner in the Midwest Airlines Center.

Kohler, who has led the worldwide producer of kitchen and bath products, engines and power systems since 1972, also is known for his development of two of the world’s highest-rated golf courses in the Kohler area north of Milwaukee. The Whistling Straits course was site of the 2004 PGA Championship and is scheduled to host many other professional tournaments.

Joining Kohler as 2006 Hall of Fame inductees are:

• Arthur M. Blank and Bernard Marcus, co-founders of Home Depot, the world’s largest home improvement retailer and the second largest retailer in the U.S.

• Maxine Clark, founder and chief executive of Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. An innovator in the retail indusry, Ms. Clark founded the teddy-bear-themed experience retail store in 1997 and has led its expansion into more than 200 locations worldwide.

• H. Wayne Huizenga, chairman of Huizenga Holdings, Inc., and owner of the Miami Dolphins. Huizenga is the only person in America to be responsible for six companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange, including three Fortune 500 companies.

• Robert A. Swanson, co-founder of Genentech, Inc. Swanson, who died in 1999, was a 29-year-old venture capitalist in 1976 when he approached Dr. Herbert Boyer,  biochemist at the University of California, San Francisco, about the possibility of developing biotechnology and marketing useful products using recombinant DNA technology. Now considered the leading biotechnology firm, Genentech is now a public company, with stock trading under the symbol DNA..

Junior Achievement, which works throughout the U.S. and in nearly 100 countries around the world to educate young people to value free enterprise, business and economics,, holds its induction ceremonies annually in cities where it has a significant presence. Major supporters of the Milwaukee events are Harley-Davidson Motor Co. and Northwestern Mutual. Also assisting with the program are Heartland Funds, Johnson Controls, Inc., Marshall & Ilsley Corp., Miller Brewing Co., Rockwell Automation and Midwest Airlines.

The chairman’s luncheon will be at noon April 27 in the Pfister Hotel. Margaret Spellings, U.S. Secretary of Education, is scheduled to speak to the luncheon. The dinner is set for 6:30 p.m. at the Midwest Airlines Center, followed by induction of the Hall of Fame members at 7:45 p.m.

JA Hall of Fame members are featured in an exhibit at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry.

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