“I love Mickey Mouse more than any woman I have ever known.”

                                                                                 -Walt Disney

When it comes to cartoon, it has to be Disney. As we were growing up, the better part of our childhood was dominated by Disney cartoons. Cartoons are, well, the heart and mind of the company. The Walt Disney Company was founded in 1923 by Walt Disney and Roy O. Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio. In the initial years it was more of an animation company, before it ventured into live action film production, motion pictures and amusement parks. It was renamed to its current name in 1986 and plunge din much broader aspects of the industry, including theater, radio, music, publishing and also online media. The Disney Company is best known for its film studio, Walt Disney Studios, which is one of the largest and best studios of Hollywood. Disney also owns and operates networks such as the ABC broadcast television network, ESPN, Disney Channel, and also 14 theme parks in the world.

“I am Born”

Early in 1923, Walt Disney created the short film called Alice’s Wonderland and then move to Hollywood after his previous undertaking called Laugh-o-Gram Films went bankrupt. There he joined his brother and formed Disney Brother Cartoon Studio the same year. After the completion of the Disney Studios, the studio was renamed as Walt Disney Studios.

After the demise of Alice comedies, Disney began its first all cartoon show, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, which was distributed by Winkler Pictures. Since the distributor owned the character, Disney did not make much of a profit from the character and ultimately Winkler’s husband took over the distribution company. He hired away four of Disney’s main animators after he failed to take away the entire Disney Company and started his own studio.

Mickey Mouse

After the losses suffered from Oswald, Disney one day came up with a mouse character, called Mortimer in 1928 when he was on a train to California. This was the mouse which later became world famous as Mickey Mouse. On November 18 the same year, Disney released its first sound film, Steamboat Ville, which starred Mickey Mouse. The film was an immediate hit but the credit did not go to Mickey Mouse initially. It went to the fact that it was the first sound film and hence it was a huge success.

Many cartoons were continued to be produced by Disney with Mickey Mouse as the central character, when in September 1929, theatre manager Harry Woodin suggested starting a Mickey Club, which was ultimately approved by Disney and later test comic strips were sent to King Features. In the meantime, Walt Disney Studios was reorganized as Walt Disney Productions Limited, which had a merchandise division and two other subsidiaries. On December 30, 1929, the first strip of Mickey Mouse comics was published in New York Mirror. Due to the immense popularity of Mickey Mouse, Disney planned to make its first feature length animation film.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

The company and its idea of its cartoons were huge success. So Walt Disney decided to produce a feature length animation film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It took three years to complete and after its premiere in December 1937, it became the highest grossing film of that time. With the profits of this film, Disney built a studio in California. This Walt Disney studio is now the headquarter of the company.

From this studio, Disney continued to produce several other animation films like, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi etc. which all became famous.

Post World War II

After the World War where many of Disney’s staffs were sent to the war, the company produced collection of short films and released them together, but the films performed quite poorly. The fortunes of the company took a turn in 1950 when Cinderella became a hit and proved that there was still market for feature length animation films. There were several other films from Disney during this period, which all went on to become cult cartoon films, such as, Alice In Wonderland, Peter Pan, Treasure Island, The Sword and the Rose, 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea and more.

We all love Disneyland

After the super successful Disneyland series on the ABC network, Walt Disney opened the very famous Disneyland to the general public. Year after year, it continued to attract visitors from all around the world. Few years later, Disney announced the launch of Disney World, which would have theme parks, hotels and a model city and Disney purchased thousands of acres of land in Florida.

The film studios of Disney released a series of animated films which are very popular now, like, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty, One Hundred and One Dalmatians and adapted many children’s books into animated movies.

After the death of Walt Disney in December 1966, his brother Roy Disney took over the company and named Disney World as Walt Disney World in honor of his late brother. In 1967, two films were released which were the last ones to be supervised by Walt Disney, The Jungle Book and The Happiest Millionaire. Later in 1971, Roy Disney too died of a stroke and left the company with Donn Tatum, Card Walker and Walt Disney’ son in law Ron Miller.

The company now has several subsidiaries, namely, Walt Disney Studio, Disney Theatre Group, Disney Music Group, Hong Kong Disney Resort, Disney Cruise Line, Pixar Studios, The Muppet Group, Disney India Ltd., Lucas Film, Marvel entertainment and lots more. In the year 2003, Disney studio was the first studio in the world that obtained revenue of $3 billion worldwide. The Disney Company has 51% ownership in Disneyland Paris and holds 48% interest in Hong Kong Disneyland.

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Career/Profession: Actress

Age: 40

“I don’t know what I did in life to deserve all of this. I’m just a girl from a trailer park who had a dream.”

                                                                                               -Hilary Swank

Hilary Swank is an American actress who has won the Academy Award for Best Actress twice and also received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She made her film debut with a small role in Buff the Vampire Slayer in 1992 and then got her breakout role in the fourth film of the Karate Kid series. Her power packed performance in Boys Don’t Cry and Million Dollar Baby earned her all the major awards. She has won our hearts with her performance in films like, P.S. I Love You, The Gift, Insomnia, New Year’s Eve, The Reaping, Freedom Writers, Iron Jawed Angels and many more.

Happy Birthday to You

Hilary Ann Swank was born on July 30, 1974 to a dancer mother and a sergeant father. She attended the school in Bellingham till the age of sixteen. She competed in the Junior Olympics and Washington state championships in the events of swimming and gymnastics. The acting bug hit her when she made her first stage performance at just the age of nine as a part of The Jungle Book in her school play. After her parents separated, she moved with her mother to Los Angeles with the dream of becoming an actress.

I want to be an Actress

Hilary Swank was first seen in the film Buffy the Vampire Slayer in a very small role and later in Quiet Days in Hollywood. The first major role she earned was in the fourth installment of The Karate Kid series, called The Next Karate Kid, where she utilized her gymnastics abilities. Next she was seen with British actor Bruce Payne in the film Kounterfeit. She was also seen in the television series Cries Unheard: The Donna Yaklich Story and then in 1997 she was seen as the single mother in Beverly Hills 90210. Her character was dropped out after the initial few episodes, which left her devastated.

After being dropped out from Beverly Hills 90210, she auditioned for Boys Don’t Cry and lost all her body fat for the role. She got a lot of critical appreciation for this role and some even hailed as the best female performance of that year. She went on to win the Golden Globe and Oscar for Best Actress for this film.

The next step of success came for her when with Million Dollar Baby in 2004 where she underwent rigorous training to gain 19 pounds. This film again won her the second Golden Globe and Oscar. She was one of the very few who was twice nominated for the Oscar and Golden Globe and had won it both the times. In 2007, she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

She stares in the 2007 drama Freedom Writers which was a real life story about a teacher who inspired a class. This role earned her critical appreciation. The same year, Hilary Swank was seen in the horror flick, The Reaping and also in the rom com, P.S. I Love You. She was seen in the biopic Amelia where she played the role of a pioneering aviator. In 2012, her audio book recording was released which was Caroline Knapp’s Pack of Two: The Intricate Bond Between People and Dogs.

Charity work

For a girl who came from such a middle class background, it is common to be involved in charity, because they best understand how needy people need help.

1. Blue Planet Run Foundation

Hilary Swank had campaigned for the charity organization, whose mission is to create awareness of the crisis of safe drinking water, and organized a relay race and utilized the money raised for safe drinking water.

2. Cinema For Peace

Hilary Swank has been giving in a lot of effort for this organization, which was started in 2002 and aims at maintaining peace and understanding through cinema.

3. Stand Up To Cancer

This is a nonprofit organization which raises money in order to assist scientists and researchers who have been researching for years to obtain a cure for cancer. Hilary Swank has participated in many of their fundraising events.

Assets I am Proud of

Enough of charity. Wanna see where the actress has spent her hard earned money on?

1. Pacific Palisades Home

This 6.700 sq. ft. Mediterranean home is owned by Hilary Swank. The house is located in the neighborhood of Los Angeles and is too large for accommodation. It has six bedrooms and six bathrooms and a large dining space. The top floor has a master suite which has arched windows, fireplace, walk in closet, and ocean view balcony. There are separate servants’ quarters too. The house has French doors and hardwood floors. There is a bar and a lounge on the lower levels of the house and a private wine cellar with a separate cigar room. There is a barbecue area along the pool and a spa.

2. Manhattan Apartment

This house is much smaller compared to the previous one. It has got that warm, cozy feeling. It has a master suite and a small kitchen and few other rooms, but the bathroom is really large and spacious.

3. Porsche 911 Carrera

Hilary Swank drives this black car herself which has got a 350 bhp 3.4 liter flat 6 engine that goes from 0 to 62 mph in just 4.6 seconds.

4. Mercedes Benz CLK 350 Coupe

This car has got a chic business class appearance. It is slimmer and can be easily parked in smaller spaces. It has a 68 horsepower 3.2 liter V6 that comes along with a 7 speed automatic transmission.

5. BMW Hydrogen 7

This 7 series sedan has a V12 engine that can be powered by both hydrogen and gasoline.

this is one rags to riches girl, who deserves all that she has earned over the years. we want to see more of her!

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Career/Profession: Singer, Songwriter, Producer

Age: 41

“There is a lot of reflection that goes on whenever I write a song. It’s been a wild whirlwind last couple of years and there’s a lot to talk about, and hopefully that’s evident in the music.”

                                                                                                                             -Nick Lachey

Nicholas Scott Lachey is an American singer and songwriter, who particularly became famous as the lead singer of the boy band 98 Degrees. He appeared in a television series with his ex wife Jessica Simpson and also in a recurring role in the series Charmed.

Melodious Career

Nick Lachey went to the School of Creative and Performing Arts and later to Miami University in Oxford. He started his singing career in mid 1990s with his friend at Kings Island, where he played at a park. Later they formed the boy band 98 Degrees with the members being Nick Lachey’s brother Drew Lachey, Justin Jeffre and Jeff Timons. Their debut album, called 98 Degrees, was not much of a success and did no good to the band. However, their next album, 98 Degrees and Rising was a huge success and sold over 10 million copies till date.

In 2003, Nick Lachey and his then wife Jessica Simpson appeared on the MTV reality show, Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica. This show won the People’s Choice Award for Favorite Reality Show and soon ended. They also appeared together on the Nick & Jessica Variety Hour in 2004. His album, SoulO, which was also his debut solo album, released in 2003 during his reality show. But the album failed to impress the audience.

His next solo album What’s Left of Me made up for the loss. The album released in May, 2006 and right in the first week made its way into the Billboard 200 at number 2. The album sold more than 5 lakhs copies and was certified Gold. The first single of the album which was self titled, “What’s Left of Me” was immensely popular. It reached number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. Around this time he also recorded the song Ordinary Day for the film For One More Day, which was produced by Oprah Winfrey. Nick Lachey also appeared on the popular television series One Tree Hill in two episodes in its sixth season.

In March 2009, Nick Lachey produced a musical reality show called Taking the Stage which documented the lives of students at the School for Creative and Performing Arts, the school where Lachey himself studied. Few months later, in December 2003, Nick Lachey hosted the four part singing competition called The Sing Off for the first, second and third seasons. He also resumed hosting Big morning Buzz Life on VH1 since March 3, 2014.

Sportsmanship Spirit

Nick Lachey is a co owner of a team of the American Basketball Association called Hollywood Fame. The team began to play in 2006. He was also a part of the group that owned Tacoma Rainiers. Lachey is also a huge diehard fan of the teams Cincinnati Bengals, Cincinnati Reds and Cincinnati Bearcats. In April 2007, he threw the first pitch at the ceremony of the opening day game in Cincinnati in Ohio. Nick Lachey, the singer also sang the National Anthem for America at the inaugural of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race in Kentucky.

His Assets

So you think you already know enough about him? Not till you get a glance of his lifestyle and the assets he proudly possesses. Let me give u short trip of Nick Lachey’s assets.

1. Encino House

This posh 8, 134 sq. ft. house belonging to Nick Lachey royally stands on an area of 0.5 acre. The house has 6 bedrooms and 8 bathrooms and is nicely located in front of the Encino Reservoir. The house is built in a Rustic Tuscan theme. It has a master suite, a huge swimming pool, a fire pit, multi camera security system like every other celebrity house has, sound system and a wine cellar.

2. BMW 654

This is one of Nick Lachey’s favorite possessions. This black BMW car of the 6 series was bought by Nick Lachey several years ago and since then he has been seen driving around in this car on many occasions.

Charity

Feeding America in the States is a non profit organization that has a nationwide network which consists of more than 200 food banks and food rescue organizations that serve every country in the United States in times of crisis by providing food to the distressed. Nick Lachey, well, is a part of the Entertainment Council of Feeding America.

Nick Lachey’s wedding

After getting separated from Jessica Simpson, Nick Lachey married the VJ Vanessa Minnillo. The entire wedding was a four day affair and it took place on Sir Richard Branson’s private island, the Necker Island. The entire venue was beautifully decorated with flowers and there was a rehearsal dinner before the wedding day. The entire wedding venue was decorated with roses, cockscombs, tulips, dianthus and air plants. The long stretch of the tables, which were ready with placemats and napkins, were lined with lanterns all through, making the illumination look breathtaking. Vanessa Minnillio’s wedding dress was particularly an attraction of the wedding. It was designed by Monique Lhuillier and was a two piece dress unlike most other wedding gowns. It featured a delicately and finely embellished lace corset which was finely detailed with rose and crystal. The skirt was made of silk faille and the dress got a complete look with a bow belt.

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“The ultimate search engine would basically understand everything in the world, and it would always give you the right thing. And we’re a long, long way from that.”

                                                                      -Larry Page, Co founder, CEO, Google.

Google needs no introduction. It is an American multinational corporation which specializes as a search engine and other internet related services. More than its literary definition, Google is a life savior for people across the globe.

Early Days

Larry Page and Sergey Brin started Google back in 1996 when they were doing their PhD at Stanford University. What they did differently for mother conventional search engines was that they developed a better system called Page Rank, which analyzed the relationships and connections between various websites. Unlike other search engines which counted the number of times a particular word or phrase was searched for and ranked results according to that, Google ranked the relevance of a website according to how many pages it had and their importance.

Google was initially called ‘BackRub’ by Page and Brin because the new search engine checked back links to a website. The name Google came when the word ‘googol’ was misspelled. Googol meant one hundred zeros after one, so the search engine was immediately named Google which meant that it would provide huge amount of information about anything under the blue sky. Initially Google was operated under the website of Stanford University. It was registered on September 15, 1997 and the company started operating in a friend’s garage in Menlo Park. Craig Silverstein who was a PhD student at Stanford University was the first hired employee by Google.

The first funding for Google came in August 1998 from Andy Bechtolsheim, the co founder of Sun Microsystems, who donated $ 1, 00, 000. In 1999, Google founders Page and Brin decided to sell off Goggle as it was taking up too much time and hampered their studies. They offered to sell it to Excite CEO, George Bell for an amount of $1 million, which he rejected. In 1999, Google got a funding of $25 million from major investors.

Five years later in 2004, Google received its initial public offering when Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt decided to work together till 2024. The company let out 19,605,052 shares which were sold at an online auction at $85 per share. The sale of shares increased the market capitalization of Google to over $23 million, which by January 2014 had grown to $397 billion.

“I am big now”

In March 1999, Google shifted its office from Menlo Park to Palo Alto in California. The next year, Google started selling advertisements with each keywords that was searched for. The advertisements, thought, were exclusively text based so as not to decrease the speed of the page and make it look clean.

In September 2013 Google launched a new company called Calico, which in future will be operated by Apple. By September 2013, Google had 70 offices operating in 40 countries. Google now is a part of the coalition of public and private organizations called the Alliance for Affordable Internet, which includes other sites like Facebook, Intel and Microsoft. This organization aims towards making internet access affordable so that more and more people can access it.

Since 2001, Google has been acquiring many companies, mostly small capital funded firms. In 2004, Google acquired the startup company Keyhole Inc. and rename it as Google Earth. The big turn came when in 2006 Google had acquired You Tube, the video search engine. In 2007, Google acquired DoubleClick and GrandCentral for $3.1 billion and $50 million respectively. It renamed GrandCentral as Google Voice. Google kept on acquiring more and more companies.

On August 15, 2011, Google made its biggest acquisition when it acquired Motorola Mobility. This move was made to help Google gain Motorola’s patent portfolio in a time when rival companies like Microsoft and Apple were battling against Android. Gradually, Google fired 4,000 Motorola employees and sold its manufacturing units to Flextronics. On January 2014, Google announced that it was selling Motorola Mobility unit to Lenovo.

“I have the best products”

In 2011, Google earned 96% of its revenues from advertisements, thanks to DoubleClick, which Google had acquired. Using the DoubleClick techonology, Google presents relevant advertisements to target audience that would help them.

Another product, Google Analytics helps the owners of websites to track the usage of their website by the public. Google’s advertising products, AdWords and AdSense help website owners to earn money every time the advertisements the websites display are clicked.

One of Google’s biggest products, Gmail, the free e mail service, was launched in April 2004 but was available to the public only since 2007. This was the first mailing service in the world which kept all the mails from one conversation in a single box. Gmail provides 15GB free storage to every user.

Google Apps, another product from Google, permits organizations to bring products of Google like Gmail or Google Docs into their domains. There are many other versions of this Google Apps, like Google Apps for Business, Google Apps Standard which is the basic free version, Google Apps for Education, Google Apps for Government etc.

Another product, Google Translate is a translation service, which can translate the data in 35 different languages. Google also started Google News in 2002, which automatically summarized news from various news websites.

Among all the other products, not to forget Google Chrome, the web browser, which is used by millions of Internet users across the world.

The Internet King also does Charity

In 2004, Google started the nonprofit organization, called Google.org, with the objective to create awareness about climate change, global public health and global poverty. It had a start up fund of $1 billion. In 2008, Google launched another project which invited ideas on how to help the community ad had Google users vote their favorites. Two years later, Google announced the names of the winners and gave away prizes worth $ 10 million.

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Career/Profession: Singer, Songwriter

Age: 36

Don Omar, originally known as William Omar Landron Rivera is a famous singer from Puerto Rico. Born on February 19, 1978 to parents William Landron and Luz Antonia Rivera in Puerto Rico, he is the eldest child of his parents. From a very early age, he showed interest in music. Little did we know that this little boy is someday going to be the world famous rapper and song writer. When he grew up a little, he got actively involved and became a member of a Protestant church in Bayamon and there he at times would serve sermons. But after four years, this work started to bore him and he left the church work to pursue and nurture his passion in singing.

Here Comes the Singer

The first performance Don Omar made as a singer was at a nightclub where he was accompanied by the DJ there, Eliel Lind Osorio. That was where his journey had started, but he still had a long, really long way to go. Ever since that performance in the nightclub, he began to collaborate with many disc jockeys and music producers and began to appear in their albums. While recording songs in other artists’ compilation albums, he once sang as one of the backup singers for Hector & Tito. It was Hector Delgado, who helped Don Omar produce his first solo album.

Don Omar’s first studio album, The Last Don was a blockbuster and the huge success of this album brought him in limelight. It was Platinum certified by the Recording industry Association of America. According to sources, the album has sold over 10, 00,000 copies worldwide. This album won Don Omar the Latin Pop Album of the Year award and Latin Rap/Hip Hop Album of the Year award at the Billboard Latin Music Awards in the year 2003. The album was also nominated at the 2005 Latin Grammy Awards.

His next album in 2006, King of Kings was a smash hit, which went on to become the highest ranking reggae ton album in the top 10 US charts ever. The album made a debut at the number one position on the Latin charts and also on the Billboard Latin Rhythm Radio Chart. Don Omar surpassed and broke the record set by Britney Spears’ record with Virgin music store of the Disney World. The album King of Kings was ranked number 7 with more than 74,000 copies sold. Time for awards again. This time Don Omar won the Latin Billboard Award for the Reggae ton Album of the Year in 2007. The album was regarded as the Most Successful Album of the decade in Latin America and also the Most Successful Album in the history of this genre of music by Billboard. The album was said to have sold more than 4.1 million copies worldwide by 2009. Few of his songs were even used in super hit films like Fast Five, Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift etc.

His next album iDon came in 2009 and the songs in the album became the most requested song on Latin American radio stations.

Next in line was Don Omar’s 2010 album, Don Omar Presents: Meet the Orphans featured many artists and many reggae ton artists under his record label, Orfanto Music Group. The album used the song ‘Hasta Abajo’ as its promotional single. There were also songs by artists like Lucenzo, Kendo Kaponi, Syko, Zion & Lennox, Yaga & Mackie and Danny Fornaris.

Don Omar’s latest and most recent album was out in 2012, which was called Don Omar Presents MTO2: The New Generation, which featured the newest artist of record label Orfanto Group, Natti Natasha. It also featured many other reggae ton artists. One song from this album called ‘Hasta Que Salga El Sol’ won the Best Urban Song award at the 2012 Latin Grammy Awards and Natti Natasha’s ‘Dutty Love’ was nominated at the award. This album was a huge blockbuster as well. It won the Best Urban Music Album of the Year award and was a top seller on iTunes as well.

Few of his other hit albums are, the Armageddon edition of the King of Kings in 2006, Don Omar Presenta: Los Bandoleros and Da Hitman Presents Reggae ton Latino in 2005, Don Omar Presenta: Los Bandoleros Reloaded in 2006 and Don Omar Presenta: El Pentagono in 2008.

This high profile rapper and singer has four children. After his divorce from his journalist wife, he now supports and raises all four of his kids. So his expenditures basically revolve around his children and bringing them up. But some of his huge investments include the posh New Jersey bungalow he had bought and his fetish for cars that he is famous for. He is also known for spending a lump sum amount of money for the promotion of his shows or his soon to be released albums.

All is well for Don Omar if only he learns to change his attitude. Don Omar is infamous for cancelling his shows and live performances at the last moment and at times also changes the concert schedule at a moment’s notice, thus incurring huge losses on the promoters. He is one singer who has to regularly pay the highest amount of bail due to this attitude and the losses people suffer due to him. If only he changed this habit!

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Career/Profession: Business magnate, Philanthropist

Age: 84

“Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree long time ago.”

                                                                                                                -Warren Buffett.

This single humble man is considered to be the most successful businessman of the 20^th century. He is the chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, and is undoubtedly one of the richest personalities of the world. He is also known widely for his philanthropic causes and charitable works. He had pledged to donate 99% of his wealth to charitable causes.

The Birth of Greatness

Warren Buffet was born in Omaha in 1930 to U.S Congressman Howard Buffett and Leila. He went to the Rose Hill Elementary School in Omaha and later moved to Washington D.C where he attended junior school and graduated in 1947. Ever since his childhood days, Warren Buffett was very particular about making and saving money in all possible manners. He made money by doing chores like selling newspapers, Coca Cola, selling golf balls and car detailing and many others. He was also interested in the stock market from a very early age. In 1947, he joined the Wharton School under the University of Pennsylvania and later went to University of Nebraska-Lincoln and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in business administration. He then got his masters degree in Economics from the Columbia Business School.

Hard Earned Success

In 1950, when Buffett was all of 20, he saved almost $ 9,800 and in 1952 when he discovered that Benjamin Graham was on the board of GEICO insurance, he took a train to Washington D.C and reached the GEICO headquarters there. He met the Vice President of GEICO and discussed about business. He also worked for Benjamin Graham there.

After returning to Omaha, Warren Buffett was working as a stockbroker and simultaneously was taking Dale Carnegie public speaking course. Using that knowledge and experience, he went on to teach Investment Principles at the University of Nebraska, Omaha.

He got married in 1952 to Susan Thompson. In 1954, he started working with Benjamin Graham, where he earned $12,000 a year. After Benjamin Graham retired, he closed the partnership. So Buffett, who had by then saved $1,74,000, started his own investment company, Buffett Partnership Limited.

By 1962, Buffett became a millionaire because of all the partnerships we was operating at that time. He merged all those partnerships into one company and then started Berkshire Hathaway as a textile business. But after his partnerships started purchasing shares of Berkshire Hathaway, he had to close the textile business and moved the company to the insurance sector. Within a few years, Buffett was named in the Forbes 400 list for the first time when his net worth reached $620 million. This was the time when Buffett began acquiring shares in the Washington Post and ABC. He also purchased stocks in the Coca Cola Company and purchased 7% of the company, which is regarded as one of his most successful investments.

 “I am a billionaire now”

In May 1990, when the market was closed at $7, 7175 per share of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett officially became a billionaire. In 1998, he made an unusual move by acquiring Gen Re for stock, which provided reinsurance when Buffett got involved with Maurice R. Greenberg at AIG. Greenberg was forced to resign due to the AIG fraud and Berkshire Hathaway got a compensation of $92 million form AIG.

In 2002, Buffett’s net worth was $11 billion and used to forward contracts and delivered US dollars in return for other currencies. His profit from these contracts was more than $2 billion and he decided to give away 85% of the Berkshire profits to charity, the largest of which went to Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In 2008, Buffett was the richest person in the world with a net worth of $62 billion.

Charity

Warren Buffett is perhaps the richest man to do the most numbers of charitable donations.

1. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

In 2006 when Warren Buffett decided to give away 85% of his wealth to charities, he declared that 83% of it would go to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This became the largest donation ever in history.

2. The Giving Pledge

This organization in the US is one which encourages the richest people in the country to donate most of their wealth for charitable purposes. Buffett is a part of it and one of the highest donors to charity.

3. Lunch with Buffett

Every year, whoever wins the Lunch with Buffett auction, Warren Buffett has lunch with him and all the collections from the auction goes to charity.

My assets

For a man as high as Warren Buffett, we all expect him to have high end cars and posh mansions. Let’s have a closer look what this man has got

1. Laguna Beach Home

This house was purchased by Buffett in 1996 for $1,00,000 but later sold it in 2005. This mansion is isolated from the busy city and offers a beautiful view of the Pacific Ocean. This house stretches over an area of 3,103 sq. ft. and has four grand bedrooms and four bathrooms. The house has glass walls which make the view of the ocean even more beautiful.

2. Omaha Home

This is probably the most modest home any billionaire has lived in. This house in the Happy Hollow neighborhood is where Buffett still lives, without any security. This house, bought in 1958, has an area of 6,234 sq. ft. and has 5 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms.

3. The Indefensible Private Jet

Buffet’s private jet is one of the most luxurious business class jets in the world. This 16-seater has leather seats and a Rolls Royce powered engine.

4. Lincoln Town Car

This luxurious sedan was owned by Buffett before he auctioned it off in 2007 for charity.

This one man shows us how humble and kind hearted a man can be even after tasting immense success.

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Career/Profession: Retired professional Tennis player

Age: 44

“I question myself every day. That’s what I still find motivating about this. I don’t have the answers; I don’t pretend that I do just because I won the match. Just keep fighting and maybe something good happens”.

               -Andre Agassi

Andre Kirk Agassi is a retired American tennis player who was formerly the world’s number one. He is considered to be the greatest tennis players of all time by his contemporaries and critics. He is an eight time Grand Slam champion and had won gold medal at the 1996 Olympics. Agassi was the first male tennis player to win Grand Slams on three different surfaces and also the last American player to win the American Open and French Open. His playing career saw serious troubles when his world ranking fell down to 141 and many believed that his playing days were over. But he shot back to being number one in 1999. He retired from the game in 2996 after having serious health issues.

My origins

Andre Agassi was born in Las Vegas to a former Olympic boxer father and a breast cancer survivor mother. Agassi was admitted to Nick Bollettieri’s tennis school in Florida, where his father could afford only three months of the fees. But after watching Agassi at play, Bollettieri decided to train him for free. He claimed that he had never seen such a talented player as Agassi before.

Climbing the ladder of success

Andre Agassi played his first professional match when he was just sixteen at La Quinta in California. There he won the first match, but lost the second one. After winning his debut top level singles title at the Sul American Open, he ended up being world number 25 straight from the world number 91 rank. By the end of that year he had won six tournaments and became the fastest person in history to surpass the US$1 million prize money in just 43 tournaments. That year he also set a record for the maximum number of consecutive victories in tennis matches by any male teenager, which stood strong for almost two decades. He ended that year at the third position and was named The Most Improved Player of the Year in 1988.

Being a teenager he was regarded as the next big thing on the block when he reached the semi finals of both the French Open and US Open in the same year. But the beginning of the next decade, 1990 that is, saw more misses than hits. In 1990, he reached his first Grand Slam finals at the French open where he lost the match. He reached the second Grand Slam finals and again lost it to Pete Sampras. In 1991, Agassi again reached the Grand Slam finals but lost the match. It was then that he decided to play at the Wimbledon. His breakthrough match was the one where he defeated Goran Ivanisevic. For the next ten years, no other player could defeat Andre Agassi at Wimbledon. He was named the BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year in 1992.

N 1994, with a new coach, Brad Gilbert, Agassi began improving in his game and resurged at the tournaments that year. Though there were a few initial misses at the French Open and Wimbledon, he re emerged later and won the Canadian Open and then in the US Open.

In 1995, Agassi, for the first time, was placed at world number one ranking, which he held for 30 weeks. That year, Andre Agassi won 73 matches and lost only 9. That year for the third time in row, Agassi won the Davis Cup for the US.

1996 was a tough year for Agassi as he failed to make his mark and did not reach any Grand Slam final even, let alone winning any title. But the only saving grace that year was the gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. 1997 saw the downfall of Andre Agassi, when his injury resurfaced and he played very few matches that year. He did not pass the ATP drug test and was warned by ATP. He also had a troubled marriage and his world ranking suffered a hard blow when it fell down to 141. Everybody thought Agassi’s sports career was over.

In 1998, Agassi got back his sportsman spirit and after a lot of hard work and practice, he sprang up to world number 6 in just a single year. Later that year he got back his position as the world number one, after winning five titles that year. In 1999 Agassi became a part of the history to win all the four Grand slam titles on three different types of surfaces. Andre Agassi became the first male player to win the Career Golden Slam. He ended the year as world number one. His ranking in 2001 dropped down slightly and he ended the year as world number 3.

Andre Agassi finally retired from the game in 2006, after a series of wins, and received a standing ovation from the crown after his final match.

Charitable Work

Agassi has been regarded as one of the most charitable tennis players who has been involved in charity. He founded the Andre Agassi Charitable Association and was awarded the ATP Arthur Ashe Humanitarian award in 1995 for his undying efforts to help the underprivileged youth. He also has a Boys & Girls Club helps around 2,000 children a year to inspire the sportsmanship in them. In 2001, he opened a tuition free charity school for children in the areas prone to natural calamities. He also supports the Andre Agassi Charitable Foundation which looks after abused children and provides residential facilities to them.

Truly, he is a humble man and we all love him, even years after he has retired. Don’t we?

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Career/Profession: Indian politician

Age: 68

“It was through the private world of family that the public world of politics came alive for me; living in intimate proximity with people for whom larger questions of ideology and belief, as well as issues relating to politics and governance, were vivid daily realities.”

-Sonia Gandhi.

Now this is one lady who does not need any kind of introduction. She is an integral part of Indian politics, like the rest of her in laws. Sonia Gandhi is the 12^th richest political leader in the world. Need we say more? Born on 9 December 1946, she is the widow of former Prime Minister of India Rajiv Gandhi and the daughter in law of late Indira Gandhi. For a long time, she stayed away from politics even though her family was actively involved in it. She was invited by the Indian National Congress party to take over the government after her husband’s assassination, but she refused it straight away. Much later, in 1997, she agreed to join politics and has been the President of the Congress ever since.

“Those were the best days of my life”

The childhood days, silly. They are undoubtedly the best days of anybody’s life, even if the person in question is a politician, people who are considered to be the most corrupted beings on the planet. Sonia Gandhi, or Edvige Antonia Albina Maino, was born at Lusiana, which is a small village in Italy to parents Stefano and Paola Maino. She spent her teenage days in Orbassano, where she was raised in a Roman Catholic family and went to a Catholic school.

In 1964, she went to study English language at the language school in the city of Cambridge. There she met Rajiv Gandhi in 1965 who was studying in Trinity College at the University of Cambridge. The two got married in 1968 and she moved to India. They had two children, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi. In spite of belonging to such a strong political family, the couple stayed away from politics. But Rajiv Gandhi entered into politics in 1982 after the death of his brother Sanjay Gandhi in a plane crash. Sonia Gandhi, on the other hand, continued to take care of the family and the kids. After the assassination of Indira Gandhi and after Rajiv Gandhi became the Prime Minister of India, Sonia Gandhi started her role as his official hostess and accompanied him on quite a few numbers of his state visits.

Active Participation in Indian Politics

After Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in 1991, she was the next obvious choice for the post of the Prime Minister of India. But she refused the post. So P.V Narsimha Rao was elected as the leader of the party and also the Prime Minister of India. Over the next few years, Congress saw a downward sloping graph and lost its fortunes when Congress lost the 1996 Lok Sabha elections. Many senior leaders split from the party. It was then when Sonia Gandhi joined the party with the aim to revive the party’s lost glory. She joined as a primary member in 1997 and then went on to become the party leader in 1998. 62 days later she was made the party President and she contested Lok Sabha elections from Bellary and Amethi. Quite surprisingly, she defeated veteran BJP leader Sushma Swaraj in Bellary.

She was also elected the Leader of Opposition of the 13^th Lok Sabha in 1999 when the BJP led NDA formed a government against Atal Bihari Vajpayee. She called a no confidence motion against the government in 2003.

Life since 2004 Elections

In the 2004 general elections, Sonia Gandhi launched a nationwide campaign with the slogan of the Aam Aadmi and in the election, she won by a large margin from the Rai Bareilly constituency, where she was contesting the elections for. She was then chosen to lead the 15 party coalition government which was called the United Progressive Alliance or the UPA. Once again the issue of her foreign origin came in to question and the opposition party NDA was not ready to accept her as the Prime Minister of India. So Sonia Gandhi appointed Manmohan Singh as the Prime Minister, who has been serving the post for the past ten years.

Sonia Gandhi is currently serving as the President of the United Progressive Alliance or the UPA. In fact, in the 125 year long history of the Indian National Congress party, she has been the longest serving president of the party for ten consecutive years. The upcoming 2012 general elections will decide the further fate of the party and its leaders as well. She has constantly been rated among the Most Powerful Women in the World; a poll ran by different organizations and magazines. In 2006, she was ranked at number 6 in the list of the World’s most Powerful Women by Forbes magazine. In 2010, she was ranked the 9^th most Powerful Person in the World by Forbes again. She personally stated that her wealth was between $2, 00,000 to $5, 00, 000. But several sources have estimated that her wealth is between $2 billion to $19 billion. According to an expose in a Swiss magazine, when Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated, he left roughly $ 2 billion in Swiss bank accounts.

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Career/Profession: Music composer, Singer- Songwriter

Age: 47

“The more I compose, the more I know that I don’t know it all. I think it’s a good way to start. If you think you know it all, the work becomes a repetition of what you’ve already done”.

Now this is one Indian no one needs an introduction about. He has not only soothed our ears and souls with his jaw dropping and mesmerizing music, but has also managed to take our motherland on a global platform with his Oscar award winning music and background score for Slumdog Millionaire. Even before the film came his way, he was scoring music for mainstream Hindi cinema for over a decade. Each of his accomplishment was something we all can proudly say was way different from one another, which quite effectively dissolved into the flavor of the film, thus etching the film in our memories for a lifetime.

Rahman has set up his own studio in Chennai, called the Panchathan Record Inn, which is one of the best and most high tech studios in Asia. In his career of more than two decades, he has worked both nationally and internationally and has won several awards which celebrate his talent. A. R. Rahman is one of the highest paid music composers of the world film industry.

The Musician is Born

Born on 6^th January 1967, this legendary musician was originally known as A.S Dileep Kumar in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, to a musically affluent family. He used to assist his father who was a film music composer for Tamil and Malayalam films during recordings where young Rahman used to play the keyboard. In his early years, Rahman used to play various instruments like keyboard, piano, harmonium, synthesizer and guitar and mastered in each of them.

In the early years, he began his training under Master Dhanraj. At 11, he joined the orchestra of Malayalam composer M.K Arjunan. Soon he started working with many other composers down south and then obtained a scholarship with Trinity College, London and graduated with a diploma in Western classical music. In 1984, he and the rest of his family converted to Islam.

Rahman’s film career began in 1992 when he was approached by film director Mani Ratnam to compose music for Roja. The film’s music was a huge hit and Rahman won the Rajat Kamal award for the Best Music Director at the National Film Awards. The success of Roja was followed by several other films, like Bombay, Kadhalan, Thiruda Thiruda and Gentleman. The soundtrack of Bombay sold 12 million copies worldwide and its tracks were used several times globally. With the music of Ram Gopal Verma’s Rangeela, Rahman made his debut in Bollywood. Films like Dil Se and Taal followed after that. Rahman won his second National Film Award for Best Music Direction in 1997 and a south Filmfare award for Best Music Direction in a Tamil film for the film Minsaara Kanavu. In the 2000s, Rhman did some really notable work with several south Indian films like Kandukondain Kandukondain, Alaipayuthey and Hindi films like Swades and Rang De Basanti.

Ladder of Success

Rahman scored music in Mandarin Chinese for Warriors of Heaven and Earth in 2003 and won the Just Plain Folks Music Award. He also bagged the Asian Film Award for best composer at the Hong Kong International Film Festival for the music of Jodhaa Akbar. In 2008, Rahman made his Hollywood debut with the music of the comedy film Couples Retreat, which earned him the BMI London Award for Best Music Score. Also, his music for the 2008 film Slumdog Millionaire won him a Golden Globe and two Academy Awards, being the first ever Asian to win these. That year he also scored the music for the youth film, Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, which was an instant hit among the youth.

In 2010, Rahman scored the music for two films down south and for Danny Boyle’s 127 Hours. In 2011, he scored music for Imtiaz Ali’s Rockstar, which remains one of his best works till date. He was widely acclaimed for the music of Rockstar and garnered both critical and commercial success.

2012 was a notable year for Rahman, when he got to work with Yash Chopra for the first and last time by scoring music for Jab Tak Hai Jaan. That year he also scored the music for Ekk Deewana Tha and for Mani Ratnam’s Kadal, which again, was a huge hit.

2013 saw two projects of Rahman, Raanjhanaa and Maryan. The soundtrack of the Tamil film, Maryan was a huge hit and it was selected as the iTunes India Best Tamil Album of 2013.

Charitable Work

A.R Rahman has always been involved in various charitable works. He was appointed the Global Ambassador of the Stop TB Partnership, a WHO project. He supports charities, like Save the Children. He worked with Yusuf Islam for a song which brought together many renowned musicians from across the world. The proceeds of the song were used to help the 2004 Tsunami victims. Rahman also composed music for a short film, called The Banyan in 2006, in aid of destitute women in Chennai.

Amidst all this success, this man remains unchanged. He is as grounded and modest as he was at the beginning of his career.

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Career/Profession: Basketball Coach, Executive

Age: 69

“If you have a positive attitude and constantly strive to give your best effort, eventually you will overcome your immediate problems and find you are ready for greater challenges.

-Pat Riley

Patrick James Riley is a professional American basketball executive and a former coach and basketball player in the NBA. He is known to be one of the greatest NBA coaches of all time who has served as the head coach of five champion teams. Currently he is the tem president of the Miami Heat. He was awarded the prestigious position of the NBA Coach of the Year thrice. Recently, Pat Riley won the 2012 and 2013 NBA championships as Miami Heat bagged the title. In fact, Pat Riley is the only American sports figure to have won a championship as a player, as a coach and as an executive. He also received the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award in June, 2012.

“Its basketball, man!”

Born in Rome, New York, Riley started playing basketball at Linton High School under coaches Walt Przybylo, Bill Rapavy and Ed Catino. During that time, the school game between Linton High School and NYC’s Power memorial, where Linton High school won by 74-68, will always be remembered for Pat Riley.

Even during his college days at the University of Kentucky, Riley was a versatile player and was named with several honorary titles, right from First Team All SEC, All NCAA Tournament Team, NCAA Regional Player of the Year, SEC Player of the Year and AP Third Team All American.

Pat Riley was selected by the San Diego Rockets during the first round of the NBA draft and was also selected by the Dallas Cowboys during the 11^th round of the draft. Nevertheless, he joined the San Diego Rockets and later was selected by the Portland Trail Blazers but was immediately traded off to the Los Angeles Lakers. Despite all this he remained a not-so-special player and retired soon after.

“Life isn’t over yet”

Playing career over? So what? Pat Riley returned to the NBA in 1977 as a broadcaster for the Los Angeles Lakers. After the team’s head coach was injured in a fatal accident, Riley’s role transformed from the broadcaster to one of the assistant coaches of the team. Riley led the team to four consecutive NBA finals. During his tenure as a coach, the Los Angeles Lakers won the NBA championship, becoming the first team in 19 years to repeat as champions. Riley stepped down as the coach of the team after they lost to the Phoenix Suns in 1990. He was still named the NBA Coach of the Year.

After his stint with the Lakers Riley took up the job of television commentator, followed by the position of the head coach of the New York Knicks in 1991. He led the team to the best regular season records and was named the Coach of the Year for the second time. The team, although, lost in seven games in the NBA Finals in 1994. So Riley resigned from New York Knicks and joined the Miami Heat as their head coach.

Though his joining the Miami Heat stirred a round of controversy, it all got cleared later on. In 1997, Miami Heat defeated Riley’s old team New York Knicks and Riley became the Coach of the Year for the third time. Few years later in 2003, Riley again stepped down as the coach of The Heat and concentrated on his duties as the general manager, after he was disappointed with the team’s performance. However, he shocked everyone when he resumed his role as a coach in 2005. But he again decided to step down after the team’s miserable performance.

Life beyond Sports

Riley published a book called Showtime: Inside the Lakers’ Breakthrough Season, in 1988 which became a bestseller in New York. His name was also associated with a video game called Pat Riley Basketball. In 1993, Riley published his second book The Winner Within: A Life Plan for Team Players which was again a New York bestseller.

We had also seen Pat Riley modeling at an Armani show, as was obvious because of his close bonding with Giorgio Armani.

Apart from this, Pat Riley is a well known motivational speaker around the world. He charges as far as $ 50, 000 for each speaking engagement.

Assets

More recently Pat Riley was in news when he sold off his Waterfront Coral Gables house for $16.75 million, which he had bought in 1996 for $6.3 million. The five bedrooms, eight bathroom mansion stretches wide across 2 acres of land in the Gables Estate Club. The mansion boasts of 12, 856 sq. ft. of living space, a media room, a wine cellar, a well stocked library with a fireplace, a pool so huge that it can host an entire franchise. What more? This magnificent palace also houses a private sandy beach and dock. The whopping amount seems quite legitimate for this beautiful bungalow.

With this we wrap up this article. Pat Riley is probably one of the greatest contributors to basketball in America, be it as a player or a coach or the president of the team. We wish him luck for all his future endeavors!

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