Steven T. Huff (born 1951) is an American

billionaire A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The American busin ...

businessman, astrophysicist and inventor. After his careers in the United States Army and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) he founded defense intelligence related companies he eventually sold. He is building one of the largest homes in the United States,

Pensmore Pensmore is a home in the Ozark Mountains near Highlandville, Missouri. One of the largest homes in the United States, it has five stories, contains 14 baths, 13 bedrooms; has exterior walls 12 inches thick, and was designed to survive earth ...

, and in retirement runs the Pensmore Foundation dedicated to philanthropy and voluntarism. Net worth is said to be around US$2.5 billion

Early life

Huff grew up in Scottsville, Virginia, moving to the Ozarks when he was 10, after which he attended Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia graduating ''

summa cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sou ...

'' and receiving his Bachelor of Science degree in physics. He then attended California Institute of Technology where he received his Master of Science degree in physics and became a member of the

Phi Beta Kappa Society The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal ar ...

Career

Upon graduation Huff served in the U.S. Army Intelligence Agency from 1975 to 1978, after which he was in the CIA from 1979 to 1983. After leaving the CIA, Huff was a co-founder of BDS, Inc.m a

Sterling, Virginia Sterling, Virginia, refers most specifically to a census-designated place (CDP) in Loudoun County, Virginia, United States. The population of the CDP as of the 2010 United States Census was 27,822. The CDP boundaries are confined to a relatively s ...

-based computer reseller valued at $27 million that in 1992 merged with BDS Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of

Titan Corporation Titan Corporation was a United States-based company that started as a telecommunications defense contractor with its headquarters located in San Diego, California. It was acquired by L-3 Communications on June 3, 2005 for $2.65 billion and oper ...

. In 1985 Huff founded Sensor Systems, Inc. as a consulting operation, merging it in 1993 with another company he founded and was vice president and Chief technology officer (CTO), Overwatch Systems, Ltd. that delivered multi-source intelligence to the United States Department of Defense. In 2009 Huff sold his companies Overwatch Geospatial Systems and Overwatch Tactical Operations to Textron Systems for what The Kansas City Star said was ''a gazillion dollars''.

Pensmore

In 2008, Huff bought TF Concrete Forming Systems and began construction of one of the largest homes in America named

, which was completed in 2016 and is located in the Ozark Mountains near Highlandville, Missouri.

Pensmore Foundation

In 2005, Huff founded the Pensmore Foundation, whose National Taxonomy of Exempt Entities (NTEE) are listed as ''Philanthropy, Voluntarism and Grantmaking Foundations: Private Independent Foundations”.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Huff, Steven T. 1951 births Living people People of the Central Intelligence Agency 20th-century American inventors 21st-century American inventors American philanthropists People from Brunswick, Missouri People from Christian County, Missouri