Background
Aaron Montgomery Ward was born on February 17, 1844, in Chatham, New Jersey. He was one of a large family with a modest income. His father was Sylvester Ward.
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Aaron Montgomery Ward was born on February 17, 1844, in Chatham, New Jersey. He was one of a large family with a modest income. His father was Sylvester Ward.
When Aaron was about nine years old, his father moved the family to Niles, Michigan, where Aaron attended public schools.
Aaron went to work at 14 in a barrel factory and later in a brickyard. In 1859 Ward became a salesman in a general store in St. Joseph, Mich., for $6 a month and board, and later he was made manager. Afterward, while working in rural areas as a travelling salesman, he became aware of the hard-pressed farmers’ resentment of the middlemen’s profit. This observation led Ward to conceive the idea of buying goods wholesale for cash and selling them by mail at a low markup for cash.
In August 1872, with a capital of $1,600, Ward issued his first catalog, a single sheet listing about 150 items. His brother-in-law, George R. Thorne, bought a half interest in the business for $500 in 1873. The 1875 catalog introduced another novelty - a money-back guarantee of customer satisfaction. By 1888 annual sales had reached $1,000,000. At Ward’s death, they were $40,000,000.
In 1886 Ward, while retaining the presidency, turned the management over to Thorne and his five sons. During the next 20 years Ward devoted much of his time to the preservation of the natural assets of the Chicago lakefront and vigorously opposed attempts to build public or other structures in the area that is now Grant Park.
Aaron Montgomery Ward is remembered as an American entrepreneur based in Chicago who made his fortune through the use of mail order for retail sales of general merchandise to rural customers. In 1872 he founded Montgomery Ward & Company, which became nationally known.
A bronze bust honoring Ward and seven other industry magnates stand between the Chicago River and the Merchandise Mart in downtown Chicago, Illinois. A smaller version of that bust is located in Grant Park.
Forbes magazine readers and editors ranked Aaron Montgomery Ward as the 16th-most influential businessman of all time.
