Frederick W. Smith was born in Memphis, Tennessee.

The Smiths were a well-to-do family, but Frederick's father died when he was only four, and the growing boy had to rely on his mother and uncles for guidance. While attending Yale University, Fred Smith wrote a paper on the need for reliable overnight delivery in a computerized information age. His professor found the premise improbable, and to the best of Smith's recollection, he only received a grade of C for this effort, but the idea remained with him. After graduation, Smith enlisted in the Marine Corps and served two tours of duty in Vietnam. As the Yale-educated son of an affluent family, Lt. Smith had some adjustments to make to the realities of war, but he cherished the advice given him by a veteran Marine sergeant: "There's only three things you gotta remember: shoot, move and communicate." While in the military, the young lieutenant observed military procurement and delivery procedures carefully, with an eye toward someday realizing his dream of a vast network dedicated to overnight commercial delivery. Smith got his chance when he left the service and started his express transport business in 1971. "I wanted to do something productive after blowing so many things up," he told an interviewer. The young entrepreneur raised $80 million to launch Federal Express, informally known as FedEx. The delivery service began modestly with small packages and documents. On the first night of operations, a fleet of 14 jets took off with 186 packages. In the first two years, the venture lost $27 million. In a short time, the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. It appeared that Smith had lost all of his investors' money, including the capital of his own brothers and sisters. But Smith succeeded in renegotiating his bank loans and was able to keep the company afloat. Unlike many entrepreneurs, Fred Smith is also a hands-on manager, who directs every facet of corporate strategy. He determined at the outset that FedEx was in the information business -- that knowledge about origin, present whereabouts, destination, estimated time of arrival, price and shipment cost of his cargo was as important as its prompt delivery. Another principle Smith applied at FedEx was to make sure every employee felt they could share in the success of the company. FedEx managers are carefully trained to ensure respect for all employees, and their performance is monitored. Mangers are evaluated annually by both bosses and workers to ensure good relations between all levels of the company. Smith believes that fair treatment instills company loyalty, and that company loyalty always pays off. Smith's professor at Yale may not have seen the need for overnight delivery, but today's business world depends on businesses like FedEx shipping all manner of goods around the globe quickly and reliably. Smith's fleet of MD11s and A300s circle the globe carrying all manner of goods: Maine lobsters, Japanese cherries, Hawaiian flowers, medicines, heart monitors, contact lenses, surgical scalpels, tennis shoes, circuit boards, fresh blood, tractor

parts, auto bumpers, European fragrances, Swiss watch parts. As Smith says: "We are the clipper ships of the computer age." In 1997, Smith acquired the $2.7 billion Caliber System, whose trucking subsidiary RPS ranked second in ground shipments, exceeded only by UPS, the United Parcel Service. The RPS fleet of 13,500 trucks increased FedEx's profit margin, because ground fleets are cheaper to operate than airplanes. It also gave FedEx the extra muscle it needed to step into the breach when FedEx competitor UPS was immobilized by a strike later that year. Fred Smith's effort to instill company loyalty bore fruit. During the UPS strike, when FedEx was swamped with 800,000 extra packages a day, thousands of employees, many of whom had already worked a full day, voluntarily poured into the hubs a little before midnight to sort the mountain of extra packages. Smith publicly thanked them in 11 full-page newspaper ads; he also ordered special bonuses. When the strike was over and the smoke cleared, FedEx had pulled roughly two percentage points of market share away from UPS, increasing its share of the express transportation market to more than 43 percent. While UPS faces additional labor unrest among its pilots, FedEx pilots are among the best-compensated and most contented in the industry. The stock market responded to FedEx's gains. Over the course of the year, the company's share price rose by nearly 70 percent. Fred Smith has never allowed FedEx to rest on its laurels. Continuous improvement is one of his fundamental management principles. in the 1990s, the company installed computer terminals in the offices of over 100,000 customers and gave proprietary software to more than half a million more, enabling shippers to label their own packages. Today, more FedEx customers print their own labels directly from the FedEx web site. FedEx receives electronic notification to pick up the cargo, then ships and delivers. Competitors in the express delivery business are still rushing to catch up with FedEx's technological advances. In 2001, FedEx made an unprecedented deal with the United States Post Office, contracting to transport large mail shipments for the Post Office, while installing FedEx drop boxes in U.S. Post Offices. Three years after, FedEx also took on international express shipments for the Post Office. That same year, FedEx purchased the document services company Kinko's, renaming the business FedEx Kinko's Office and Print Center. At over 1,000 locations across the United States, customers can print, copy and bind their documents and dispatch them for overnight shipping from one convenient location. Today, FedEx Express is the world's leading express transportation provider. As of 2007, more than 290,000 FedEx team members worldwide were fielding a fleet of 672 aircraft and 75,000 other vehicles, delivering over 7.5 million packages every business day, to more than 220 countries and territories. Fred Smith amassed a vast personal fortune by enabling the world of business to deliver its goods quickly, anywhere in the world. Businesses seeking to reduce the costs of maintaining large inventory are increasingly adopting "just in time" delivery practices, increasing the

demand for express services like FedEx. The rise of Internet commerce and the growth of the global economy are also contributing to the company's growth. FedEx has capitalized on both of these trends, with proprietary software for Internet catalogue service, and the completion of facilities in the Philippines, Taiwan and France. As of this writing, new hubs are under construction in Greensboro, North Carolina and in Guangzhou, China. Around the globe, communications and transport continue to develop along the lines undergraduate Fred Smith predicted in his term paper over 40 years ago.

Founder, chairman, chief executive officer, and president, FedEx Corporation

Nationality: American. Born: August 11, 1944, in Marks, Mississippi. Education: Yale University, BA, 1966. Family: Son of Frederick C. (businessman) and Sally (Wallace) Smith; married Linda Black Grisham, 1969 (divorced 1977); married Dianne Avis; children: ten (two from first marriage). Career: Ark Airlines, 19691971, owner; Federal Express Corporation, 1971, founder and president; 1975, chairman, president, and chief executive officer. Awards: Peter F. Drucker Strategic Leadership Award, 1997; named "CEO of the Year" for 2004 by Chief Executive magazine. In 1971 Frederick Wallace (Fred) Smith came up with a revolutionary idea: delivering packages reliably overnight. With the creation of Federal Express Corporation, Smith not only offered an alternative to the mail and more traditional and slower delivery services, but he also created an industry that almost single-handedly changed the way business was conducted. In the process, Smith's company became the first American business to earn $10 billion in profits. By 2004 FedEx was delivering to 210 countries using over six hundred aircraft, 46,000 vehicles, and 141,000 employees. But Federal Express and Smith were not just about providing fast and dependable deliveries to clients worldwide. At the root of the company's success was Smith's tried and true philosophy: people, service, profit (P-S-P). To that end, Smith worked hard at being accessible to his employees and clients with a management style that combined vision, risk-taking, a sense of community, and a toughminded approach. EARLY LIFE Smith was born in Marks, Mississippi, on August 11, 1944. The younger of two sons, Smith was named after his father, an entrepreneur and businessman who established the Dixie Greyhound Bus Lines, later a part of Greyhound Bus Lines. To further supplement the family fortune, the senior Smith and his older son established the Toddle House Restaurant chain,

which offered Southern-style cooking at locations throughout the United States. In 1948, when Smith was only four years old, his father died. Fortunately for the family, Smith senior had made enough money to ensure his familywhich now consisted of a wife, two sons, and two daugh tersa comfortable existence. However, it would be a long time before the children would see any of their father's money. Concerned that his children would squander their fortunes and waste their lives and talents, Smith senior had his money placed into a trust fund to be released to the children upon their 21st birthdays. From early childhood, Smith was troubled by a birth defect known as Calve Perthes disease, a peculiar form of childhood arthritis of the hips caused by a temporary loss of blood supply to the hip. The ailment was such that Smith spent much of his early years on crutches and in braces to stabilize his hip joint sockets. However, by the time he was 10, Smith had out grown the disease. Smith attended Memphis University Prep, where he participated in athletics and was an excellent student. He also developed a keen interest in the American Civil War. But Smith's true passion was flying; by the age of 15 he was learning the ropes while operating a crop duster. In time he became known as a skilled amateur pilot. Smith's business acumen started early; while in high school, he and a group of friends founded the Ardent Record Company, a small recording studio that later went on to become a legitimate company. In 1962 Smith left Memphis to attend Yale University. THE ROAD TO FEDEX While at Yale, Smith intended to study economics and political science. Unfortunately he found himself more drawn to campus social activities, which affected his scholastic performance. However, one incident in his junior year stood out, providing the germ of an idea that later carried Smith to success. For an economics class Smith wrote a term paper that outlined his idea for a company that would guarantee overnight delivery of small, timesensitive goods, such as replacement parts and medical supplies, to major U.S. cities. The professor was not impressed and gave Smith a grade of C for his work. But Smith's idea stayed with him, though it would be a few more years before he would have the opportunity to try it out. In 1966 Smith graduated with a degree in economics and shortly thereafter enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. As a second lieutenant, Smith was sent overseas to fight in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. Smith would do two tours in Vietnam, enrolling in flight school and eventually flying more than two hundred ground support missions. In July 1969 Smith was honorably discharged at the rank of captain with numerous honors, including a Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and two Purple Hearts. In August, Smith married Linda Black Grisham. However, the marriage would not last, and the couple divorced in 1977. Upon returning to the United States in 1970, Smith decided to revisit the idea he had written about in his economics paper. The need to create something was also spurred in part by his time in Vietnam. As he later told an interviewer, "I got so sick of destruction and blowing things up that I came back determined to do something more constructive" ( Current Biography Yearbook 2000 ). To get his fledgling business underway, Smith began by purchasing the controlling interest in Ark Aviation Sales, an aircraft maintenance company owned by his then father-in-law. By 1971 Smith had expanded the company's venue, turning

the focus from airplane maintenance to a company that bought and sold used corporate jets. But even the success of posting over $9 million in revenue and the company's seeing profits for the first time were not enough to satisfy Smith. A RADICAL IDEA By now Smith had devised a well-thought-out strategy to implement his idea while making the most of his resources. Originally Smith wanted to do contract work for the Federal Reserve System, transporting, sorting, and rerouting checks. His business plan called for a fleet of planes that would pick up packages for delivery. The planes and cargo would be flown at night, when air traffic was minimal; packages would then be dropped at a central location or hub, where they would be sorted. From there the parcels, using both ground and air, would be routed to their destinations within a 24-hour period. Smith chose Memphis as the hub city because of its central location, moderate climate, and labor resources. Smith also wanted the company to own its own planes in order to bypass federal shipping regulations. Despite Smith's proposals, which he calculated would have saved the nation's banking system an estimated $3 million a day, many financial institutions, while interested, were not convinced that Smith's ideas could realistically be carried out. On paper Smith's delivery system was simple and practical. However, there were many problems to overcome to make it work. Financially, the business required a tremendous amount of money for planes, pilots, and insurance. Smith also needed to design a transportation system that could not only link any two parts of the country but also ensure that packages going back and forth could be delivered within the promised 24-hour windowsomething that had never been tried before in cargo delivery. Although Smith was unable to convince the Federal Reserve that his plan would work, he decided to spend money on an intensive advertising campaign to persuade anyone else who might be interested in such a venture. Smith also realized that by using both air and ground transport, package deliveries did not have to take the most direct route, as long as they made it to their destinations within 24 hours. Over time a web of interconnecting cities was established that would provide Federal Express service. Finally, on June 18, 1971, Smith, then 27 years old, created the Federal Express Corporation. His startup funds consisted of $91 million from venture capitalists in addition to his own $4 million inheritance. By 1973 Smith was ready to go; Federal Express, with a fleet of 14 jets and several vans, began offering service to 25 cities. Still, as Smith later recalled, few people were encouraged by his new venture. In a 1979 interview, Smith said, "People thought we were bananas. We were too ignorant to know that we weren't supposed to be able to do certain things" ( New York Times , January 7, 1979). Federal Express's first two years were grim. In fact, on its first night of business, the fledgling company shipped only 186 packages onto its 14 Falcon jets routed to 22 cities. Within the first three months of operation, the company had lost almost a third of its start-up cash. It was not uncommon for Federal Express drivers to dig into their own pockets to pay for gas. The company also lost money because of high advertising costs (Smith believed advertising to be

essential for his company's survival) and because of increased aircraft fuel and gasoline prices resulting from the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973. Smith's sisters also brought suit against their brother for misappropriating their trust fund monies. These and other factors, such as outdated federal aviation restrictions and run-ins with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, caused FedEx to lose $29 million in its first two years of operation. However, by 1976 the company had begun to show a profit as it delivered everything from documents and computer parts to sensitive parcels, such as blood and organs. Despite competition from UPS and other delivery companies, the Federal Express customer base was growing as well; besides counting several businesses among its clientele, Federal Express was also handling deliveries for the federal government. By 1978 the company had proven itself financially stable enough to begin selling shares on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1984 Federal Express reached a milestone not only for itself but also for American business when it surpassed $1 billion in revenues. GOING GLOBAL Not content just to oversee his growing delivery network, Smith cast about for other ideas that would maintain Federal Express's position as the fastest-growing and speediest delivery service. To that end, the decades of the 1980s and 1990s were characterized by adaptation and experimentation. In 1984, to aid clients in sending documents anywhere in the United States within a short period of time, Smith created ZapMail, a satellite-based system of linked stations that guaranteed delivery of documents by fax machines and courier within two hours. Unfortunately ZapMail never really caught on with customers, and by the end of the decade, fax machines were becoming more commonplace in businesses. Finally, in 1989 Smith discontinued ZapMail, but not before it had ended up costing the company over $300 million. Federal Express also continued to suffer severe financial losses, in part because of increased competition from UPS. To combat the problem, Smith became more aggressive in dealing with the competition. In 1988 Federal Express bought the Los Angelesbased international heavy freight carrier Flying Tigers for $880 million, thereby becoming the largest all-cargo airline in the world. Now Smith had his own network of overseas delivery routes and no longer had to rely on outside contractors to make his foreign deliveries. He also negotiated the purchase of several trucking companies in an attempt to make Federal Express a more diversified freight and parcel powerhouse. Still, Smith's entry into the foreign markets suffered. Even though the company's international traffic had grown to include over 560 planes flying out of three hubs, Europe as a whole was slow to develop as an express market. In 1994 the company changed its name to FedEx. That same year Smith, sensing the importance of the Internet and trying to recuperate from losses in his international division, introduced InterNetShip, a service that allowed customers to coordinate their domestic deliveries via Internet-linked computer software. Smith also developed BusinessLink, a marketing service that provided businesses with an online catalogue of their goods directly linked to FedEx. Despite financial setbacks, the company continued to grow. By 1997 FedEx employed 120,000 employees worldwide; delivered an average of 2.5 million packages a day in 211 countries and territories through one of its 37,000 trucks; and had made Smith one of the four hundred wealthiest people in the world. In 1998 FedEx formed the FDX Company,

which served as a holding company that oversaw both domestic and international operations of the organization. A VISION OF THE FUTURE Despite intense competition and financial setbacks, Smith continued to persevere. His success came in part because of his ability to understand the changing needs of business and the importance of such things as the Internet, deregulated trade, and changing business practices. But Smith found that he had to wait for American and European business owners to understand his vision of a delivery system that promised savings, increased productivity, and improved efficiency. Smith also saw the possibilities with the Internet and the growing potential of e-commerce for the shipping industry. Toward the end of the 1990s Smith leveraged the company to take advantage of ecommerce opportunities by fostering partnerships with Webbased companies such as Sun Data, a $200 million computer company, which through its Internet sales increased the customer base for FedEx. In speeches and interviews Smith also acknowledged that the business of doing business was rapidly changing as the 20th century came to a close. With the increased availability of express shipping, Smith foresaw a trend in which companies would reduce their inventory as they became more dependent on express shipments. This development would in turn make the intermediary warehousing and distribution facilities less necessary. Smith pushed for the United States in cooperation with other countries, such as Japan, to work on fashioning a model of such a network that other countries could follow. Smith continued to increase his hold on the express delivery market. In 2003 FedEx purchased Kinko's, a large office and print store chain, for $2.4 billion. With the purchase of the company, all 1,200 Kinko's locations worldwide offered FedEx shipping services and increased FedEx's share of the express document and delivery business, helping FedEx to build an even larger customer base. By 1999 FedEx was shipping three million packages every day with annual sales totaling $16.7 billion. In 2000 the company changed names once more to the FedEx Corporation. Once again, though, the company stumbled. In streamlining company operations, Smith decided to let various divisions of FedEx operate more independently. In April 2000 it was discovered that a number of FedEx drivers and couriers had been using company vehicles to deliver more than 120 tons of marijuana in a delivery system that went back and forth between the East Coast and the West Coast. A COMPANY CULTURE Certainly one of Smith's most resounding successes was in the creation of a corporate culture that inspired an intense loyalty to the company and its founder. Smith operated his company on a basic premise that he called P-S-P: people, service, profit. The idea was that the three concepts work in a circle, each supported by the others. From the company's earliest beginnings, Smith strove to provide for his workers, even when times were tough. Even when money was tight, Smith made sure that his employees were given medical coverage. A position with FedEx remained one of the most sought-after jobs in the Memphis area, partly because of the generous wages, overtime, and benefits the company

offered its employees. Smith acknowledged the importance of his workers. For instance, during the 1990s, when UPS workers went on strike, thousands of FedEx employees worked numerous hours to process the additional 800,000 packages that flooded into FedEx centers. Smith rewarded his employees with special bonuses while taking out full-page newspaper ads to thank them for their hard work. By all accounts, Smith was a boss who worked hard at being accessible to his employees. He was known to visit the Memphis site late at night, greeting many of the employees by name. He also offered a standing invitation to any employee with 10 years of service to come to Memphis for breakfast with the boss. Although gregarious by nature, Smith tended to stay out of the limelight; when necessary, however, he showed that he was capable of impassioned and thoughtful analysis on the state of business in America and the world. A true believer in the advent of the global economy, Smith saw the future with the creation of Federal Express; his risk-taking set the standard by which other companies were often forced to measure themselves. Unafraid of new technology, Smith instead saw it as a challenge to be mastered, implemented, and used as means of furthering the global community. By following this philosophy, FedEx continued to shape the very face of global communications. "You absolutely, positively have to innovate-if only to survive."-Fred Smith While attending Yale University in the mid-1960s, Fred Smith wrote an economics term paper on the need for reliable overnight delivery in a computerized information age. His professor was less than impressed and responded: "The concept is interesting and wellformed, but in order to earn better than a 'C', the idea must be feasible." Several years later, through a combination of innovative thinking, unbridled charisma and sheer determination, Smith would use this "interesting but unfeasible" concept to found the world's first overnight delivery company and change the transportation industry forever. Smith was born to a well-to-do family in 1944 in a small suburb outside Memphis, Tennessee. His father, who died when Smith was only 4, became a self-made millionaire after founding the Dixie Greyhound Bus Lines and a chain of restaurants called the Toddle House. Smith was born with a congenital birth defect-a bone socket hip disorder called Calve-Perthes disease-which caused him to wear braces and walk with the aid of crutches for most of his youth. His mother worked diligently to build his self-esteem, and encouraged his participation in all sorts of physical activities. He eventually grew out of the disease, and in prep school, Smith played both basketball and football. After earning a bachelor's degree in economics from Yale, Smith enlisted in the Marines and was sent to Vietnam where he received an education of a very different kind. "As a platoon leader in Vietnam, I was in charge of a group of youngsters who had come from very different backgrounds than I had. You know, blue-collar backgrounds: steelworkers, truck drivers, gas station folks," Smith reveals in a 1998 Fortune magazine interview. "The experience gave me a very different perspective than most people who end up in senior management positions on what people who wear blue collars think about and the way they react to things, and what you should do to try to be fair to those folks. A great deal of what FedEx has been able to accomplish was built on those lessons I learned in the Marine Corps."

After two tours of duty, Smith left Vietnam weary of destruction and eager to focus his energy on building rather than tearing down. "I wanted to do something productive after blowing so many things up," he remembers. His stepfather, retired Air Force general Fred Hook, had bought a struggling company in Little Rock that modified aircraft and overhauled their engines, and Smith went to Arkansas to help him run it. Difficulty in getting parts brought Smith back to the overnight delivery concept he'd hit upon in college. Determined to make it work, he came up with a plan for creating an integrated air and ground delivery system in which packages from all over the country would be flown to a central point, or "hub," sorted, and then flown out again along specific routes, or "spokes" to their destinations. Under this "hub and spokes" system, the flying would be done at night, when airlanes were comparatively empty. The airports used would be in sizable cities, and trucks would carry the packages to their final destinations, whether in those cities or smaller communities. Convinced his idea was feasible, Smith decided to take the plunge with $4 million he'd inherited from his father. At that point, Smith's life became a marathon nonstop journey into the canyons of Wall Street to raise the capital he would need to purchase the fleet of airplanes vital to his plan. "I was a kind of naive about the whole thing," he confesses in a Nation's Business magazine interview. "I thought there would be basketfuls of checks right away." There weren't. But Smith kept at it. His charisma and the knowledge he gleaned from several years of studying the air-freight industry (both in the military in Vietnam and later in the United States) impressed investors, and by the end of 1972, he had managed to raise $80 million in loans and equity investments. Federal Express (FedEx) began operation in April 1971, with 14 Falcon jets servicing 25 cities. Initially business was slow. During its first night, FedEx shipped a mere 186 packages. But volume picked up rapidly and service was expanded. FedEx was an overnight success. Then the roof caved in. Because of rapidly inflating fuel prices, costs surpassed revenue, and by mid-1974, FedEx was losing more than $1 million a month. Smith asked his disappointed investors for more money to keep the company afloat, but they refused. Bankruptcy was a distinct possibility. Then fate stepped in. While waiting for a flight home to Memphis from Chicago after being turned down for capital by General Dynamics, Smith impulsively hopped a flight to Las Vegas, where he won $27,000 playing blackjack. "The $27,000 wasn't decisive, but it was an omen that things would get better," Smith says. And indeed they did. Returning to his quest for funds, he raised another $11 million. Although FedEx had lost nearly $13.4 million in its first two years, Smith never considered giving up. "I was very committed to the people that had signed on with me, and if we were going to go down, we were going to go down with a fight. It wasn't going to be because I checked out and didn't finish," he says. But FedEx didn't go down. Thanks to an aggressive ad campaign which featured the now famous line, "FedEx-when it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight," the company scored a profit of $3.6 million in 1976. Two years later, FedEx went public, and by 1980, revenue had zoomed to $415.4 million and profits soared to $38.7 million. From then on, it was smooth sailing for FedEx. By 1999, the company has become the No. 1 overnight shipper in the world, delivering more than 3 million packages to nearly 210 countries each working day.

Fred Smith, now chairman, president and CEO of FDX Corp., FedEx's parent company, compiled a fortune estimated at $700 million by enabling businesses to deliver their goods quickly, anywhere in the world. He was told it couldn't be done. But in the time-honored style of the true innovative visionary, Smith listened to his own counsel, and single-handedly changed the way the world does business.

Head Start Fred Smith displayed entrepreneurial talents early in life. He learned to fly when he was 15 and took up crop dusting as a part-time hobby. At age 16, he and two friends formed Ardent Record Co., a business that still exists today. The young entrepreneurs operated the firm profitably and even produced a number of hits, including "Rock House" and "Big Satin Mama." People + Service = Profit A key ingredient in Federal Express' success has been a corporate philosophy that emphasizes treating its workers fairly. Managers are carefully trained to foster respect for all employees, and their performance is monitored. Managers are evaluated annually by both bosses and workers to ensure good relations between all levels of the company. Fred Smith believes that fair treatment instills company loyalty, and company loyalty always pays off. 10 Things You Didn't Know About Fred Smith

1. Frederick Wallace Smith was born on Aug. 11, 1944, in Marks, Miss. Smith's father, for whom he was named, was a businessmanfounder of the Dixie Greyhound Bus Line and the Toddle House restaurant chain. He died when the younger Smith was 4 years old, but left the family financially well off. 2. As a child, Smith had Legg-Calv-Perthes Disease, a birth defect that causes arthritis in the hips. He used crutches and leg braces when he was young but outgrew the condition by the age of 10, and by the time he was in high school, Smith was playing basketball and football. 3. Long interested in flying, Smith began piloting small planes when he was still a teenager. 4. While in high school, Smith and a group of friends started Ardent Records, a small recording studio, in a garage. Local rock and R&B acts began to record there, and after Smith left the company in 1962 to attend college, his friend, John Fry, expanded the business. Still in business today, Ardent became a nationally known studio where dozens of hit records by artists from Sam and Dave to the White Stripes have been recorded or mixed. 5. As an undergraduate at Yale University, Smith wrote a paper for an economics class in which he described a concept for overnight package delivery by air freightvery similar to what his company, FedEx, would later do. An often-repeated legend holds that his professor gave him a C for the paper, but Smith later admitted that he could not actually recall what grade he had received and had just guessed that it was his "usual gentlemanly C." 6. Smith was a member of the Skull and Bones secret society while at Yale. One of his closest friends in that group was John Kerry. Another Bonesman with whom Smith was acquainted was George W. Bush, who was also Smith's fraternity brother in Delta Kappa

Epsilon. Years later, Smith said that because of his connections to the two men, he felt "kind of like the Forrest Gump of American politics." 7. After graduating from college in 1966, Smith enlisted in the Marine Corps and went to Vietnam as a second lieutenant. He served two tours of dutyone in the infantry and one as a pilotand received a number of medals, including a Bronze Star, a Silver Star, and two Purple Hearts. 8. In 1971, Smith started the Federal Express Corp. He chose the name, in part, because he was hoping to get a contract transporting checks for the Federal Reserve system. He didn't get that contract but kept the name. 9. Smith played himself in the 2000 movie Cast Away, in which Tom Hanks played a FedEx employee who was stranded on an island. 10. An avid reader of history, Smith has said that he has learned more about business by studying history than from modern leadership books.