Brownlee Owen Currey Jr. (August 14, 1928 – March 18, 2020) was an American businessman and philanthropist.Bloomberg BusinessWeek
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The Rich List 2002
''

NashvillePost.com ''NashvillePost.com'' is an online news service covering business, politics and sports in the Nashville metropolitan area. It is locally owned and available by subscription. ''NashvillePost.com'' competes with other daily news media in the Middl ...

'', July 1, 2002

Early life

Currey was born in Nashville on August 14, 1928. Currey's father, Brownlee O. Currey, was the owner of the conservative newspaper ''

Nashville Banner The ''Nashville Banner'' is a defunct daily newspaper of Nashville, Tennessee, United States, which published from April 10, 1876 until February 20, 1998. The ''Banner'' was published each Monday through Friday afternoon (as well as Saturdays unti ...

''.

Career

Currey co-founded Equitable Securities with his father, Brownlee O. Currey. In 1967, it merged with

American Express American Express Company (Amex) is an American multinational corporation specialized in payment card services headquartered at 200 Vesey Street in the Battery Park City neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City. The company was found ...

, and he received a sizeable stock portfolio in the company. In 1979, he bought the ''

'' from the

Gannett Company Gannett Co., Inc. () is an American mass media holding company headquartered in McLean, Virginia, in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. He sat on the Board of Directors of Thomas Nelson, where he held a $2.3 million stake. He served as President of Currey Investments. He served as Chairman of the Board of OCC, Inc., the Star Communications's principal subsidiary, since 1989.

Philanthropy

Currey's donations have helped build Montgomery Bell Academy's Currey Gymnasium, Vanderbilt University's Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Tennis Center, and the Currey Ingram Academy in Williamson County, Tennessee. He served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the United States Equestrian Team and as a Trustee of the Phelps Media Group, a public relations and marketing firm dedicated to the equestrian industry. He also sat on the Board of Trustees of the National Foundation for Facial Reconstruction, the International Tennis Hall of Fame, and Vanderbilt University. Professor

Richard L. Daft Richard L. Daft (born 1941) is an American organizational theorist and the Brownlee O. Currey, Jr. Professor of Management at the Owen Graduate School of Management, Vanderbilt University. Biography Daft holds a B.S. from the University of Nebr ...

is the ''Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Professor of Management'' at Vanderbilt, as is Professor Bruce Barry. The Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Gallery at the Watkins College of Art, Design & Film in Nashville is named in his honor.

Personal life

Currey was married to Agneta Currey. They had a son, Christian Brownlee Currey, and two daughters, Stephanie Currey Ingram (married to John R. Ingram) and Frances Currey Briggs. They owned River Circle Farm in Williamson County, a 300-plus-acre property around the

Harpeth River The Harpeth River, long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed June 8, 2011 is one of the major streams of north-central Middle Tennessee, United States, and one of the major ...

. They also owned a home in Manhattan, Southampton, New York and Wellington, Florida. He was an avid tennis player. In 2002, he was named the tenth richest person in Middle Tennessee. He died on March 18, 2020, aged 91.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Currey, Brownlee O. Jr. People from Williamson County, Tennessee Businesspeople from Nashville, Tennessee Philanthropists from Tennessee Vanderbilt University people 1928 births 2020 deaths