George H. Love (September 4, 1900 – July 25, 1991) was a businessman and industrialist who was in control of two major corporations—the Consolidation Coal Company and the Chrysler Corporation—and lead both back to profitability.Harvard Business School leadership database
hbs.edu.

Early life

Love was born in

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. He attended

Phillips Exeter Academy (not for oneself) la, Finis Origine Pendet (The End Depends Upon the Beginning) gr, Χάριτι Θεοῦ (By the Grace of God) , location = 20 Main Street , city = Exeter, New Hampshire , zipcode ...

and

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, and then, unable to immediately find work, became a miner and overseer in one of his family's coal mines. Later, he went on to get his MBA from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

. and spent two years as a broker in the investment field before an uncle put him in charge of three family-owned coal mines in Pennsylvania. Also during this time he was active in other areas—in 1926, he was a vice-president of Pittsburgh Union collieries, and in 1933 he became president.

Consolidation Coal Company

After Love was able to turn things around at the first three mines, Love took control of his uncle's struggling

Consolidation Coal Company Consolidation may refer to: In science and technology * Consolidation (computing), the act of linkage editing in computing * Memory consolidation, the process in the brain by which recent memories are crystallised into long-term memory * Pulmonar ...

in total in the year 1944. He turned things around by a series of

mergers and acquisitions Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspect ...

, through which he was able to broaden the economies of scale. His mergers, with Pittsburgh Coal and the

M. A. Hanna Company M. A. Hanna Company was an iron ore processing company located in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. Origin The origins of the M. A. Hanna Co. are with Daniel F. Rhodes. In the 1840s Rhodes had founded Rhodes & Company which mined coal in the Maho ...

, end up creating (at the time) the country's largest coal company. His process improvements included focusing on industrial sales rather than private distribution, major changes in the safety requirements of coal mining, removing primitive implements such as

mule The mule is a domestic equine hybrid between a donkey and a horse. It is the offspring of a male donkey (a jack) and a female horse (a mare). The horse and the donkey are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes; of the two pos ...

s and picks with modern mechanical equipment. He left the helm in 1956.

Union Efforts

Love was well known for his even-handed and fair negotiations with union leader

John Lewis John Robert Lewis (February 21, 1940 – July 17, 2020) was an American politician and civil rights activist who served in the United States House of Representatives for from 1987 until his death in 2020. He participated in the 1960 Nashville ...

and the

United Mine Workers The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unit ...

group. After his retirement, he was a chief negotiator for the coal industry as a whole with labor, leading to a 13-year period of labor peace.

Chrysler Corporation

In 1958, George Love decided he was going to get back into business. Already a multimillionaire, he became a member of the board of directors of

Chrysler Stellantis North America (officially FCA US and formerly Chrysler ()) is one of the " Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It is the American subsidiary of the multinational automoti ...

, which had suffered in losing a large portion of the

automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with Wheel, wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, Car seat, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport private transport#Personal transport, pe ...

market after World War II. In 1961, Love selected Lynn A. Townsend as president of the company, and Chrysler's fortunes were quickly reversed. Even in the 1940s, Love's coal companies were heavily invested in Chrysler, owning almost 8 percent of the automaker's stock. Eventually Love became chairman of the board in 1965, where he remained until his second retirement in 1970. He died, due to complications from

emphysema Emphysema, or pulmonary emphysema, is a lower respiratory tract disease, characterised by air-filled spaces ( pneumatoses) in the lungs, that can vary in size and may be very large. The spaces are caused by the breakdown of the walls of the alve ...

, in 1991.

Interests

Love purchased a section of

Walter Evans Edge Walter Evans Edge (November 20, 1873October 29, 1956) was an American diplomat and Republican Party (United States), Republican politician who served as the 36th governor of New Jersey, from 1917 to 1919 and again from 1944 to 1947, during both ...

Sunny Hill Plantation Sunny Hill Plantation was a large hunting plantation in northern Leon County, Florida. Plantation Sunny Hill Plantation was established by Lewis S. Thompson in 1913, and was created from the former W. G. Ponder Plantation. Just before World War ...

Leon County, Florida Leon County is a county in the Panhandle of the U.S. state of Florida. It was named after the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León. As of the 2020 census, the population was 292,198. The county seat is Tallahassee, which is also the state cap ...

and named it Loveridge Plantation. Love used this for quail hunting.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Love, George H. 1900 births 1991 deaths Businesspeople from Pennsylvania Princeton University alumni Harvard Business School alumni American energy industry businesspeople Deaths from emphysema 20th-century American businesspeople