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Greek business magnate (1906–1975)
Aristotle Socrates Onassis was a Greek and Argentine business magnate and shipping tycoon. He amassed the world's largest privately-owned shipping fleet and was one of the world's richest and most famous men. He was married to Athina Mary Livanos, had a long-standing affair with opera singer Maria Callas, and in his final years was married to American former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.
Onassis was involved in the privatization of the Greek national airline and founded the privatized Olympic Airways (today Olympic Air) in 1957. Stocks accounted for one-third of his capital, held in oil companies in the United States, the Middle East, and Venezuela. He also owned additional shares that secured his control of 95 multinational businesses in five continents. He owned gold-processing plants in Argentina and Uruguay and a large share in an airline in Latin America and $4 million worth of investments in Brazil. Also, he owned companies like Olympic Maritime and Olympic Tourist; a chemical company in Persia; apartments in Paris, London, Monte Carlo, Athens, and Acapulco; a castle in South France; the Olympic Tower (a 52-storey high-rise in Manhattan); another building in Sutton Place; Olympic Airways and Air Navigation; the island of Skorpios; the 325 ft (99.06 m) luxury yacht Christina O and, finally, deposit accounts and accounts in treasuries in 217 banks in the whole world.
Onassis died at the age of 69 on 15 March 1975 at the American Hospital of Paris in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, of pneumonia following gall bladder surgery the previous month. The pneumonia was particularly exacerbated by the cortisone he was taking for his myasthenia gravis from which he had suffered in the last years of his life. Onassis is buried on his island of Skorpios in Greece, alongside his son, Alexander, and his sister, Artemis. Onassis' will established a charitable foundation in memory of his son, the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation, which received 45% of Onassis's estate. The remainder of his estate was left to his daughter, Christina. Christina's share has since passed to her only child, Athina, at the time making Athina one of the wealthiest women in the world. Jacqueline Onassis also received her share of the estate, settling for a reported $10 million ($26 million according to other sources), which was negotiated by her brother-in-law Ted Kennedy. This amount would reportedly grow to several hundred million under the financial stewardship of her companion, Maurice Tempelsman. After Aristotle's death, Christina had settled with Jacqueline for $25 million in exchange for her not contesting Onassis's will. The Boeing 727 that transported Onassis's remains was later purchased for US$100,000 by an American electrical engineer and turned into an unconventional private residence in Hillsboro, Oregon.
Biographical detail compiled from Wikipedia and Wikidata, which are edited openly and may be incomplete or out of date. Fleet data is our own. Source →
