Background
George Russell Wackenhut was the son of William and Francis (Hogan) Wackenhut, he grew up in Upper Darby, outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1937.
George Russell Wackenhut was the son of William and Francis (Hogan) Wackenhut, he grew up in Upper Darby, outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Upper Darby High School in 1937.
Student, University Pennsylvania Wharton Evening School, 1937-1938; student, State Teachers College, West Chester, Pennsylvania, 1938-1941; Bachelor of Science, University Hawaii, 1943; postgraduate, Temple University, 1946; Master of Education, Johns Hopkins University, 1949.
He was inducted into the school"s Wall of Fame in 2000. He served in the United States. Army Corps of Engineers during World World War II and witnessed the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. He earned a bachelor"s degree from the University of Hawaii. and a master"s degree in education from Johns Hopkins University, then taught classes in physical education and health.
In 1951, Wackenhut joined the Federal Bureau of Investigation as a special agent in Indianapolis and Atlanta, handling counterfeit money and bad-check cases and tracking down Army deserters.
He resigned in 1954 to launch Special Agent Investigations in Coral Gables, Florida, with three other former agents - William Stanton, A. Kenneth Altschul and Miami lawyer and Federal Bureau of Investigation agent Editor Du Bois, Junior. Following an infamous in-office fist fight with Du Bois, Junior. in 1955, a professional split occurred and Du Bois, Junior. went on to form his own company, Investigators, Incorporated, focusing on private investigations.
In 1958, Wackenhut bought out his remaining partners, renamed the company after himself and expanded into the security guard field, and went public in 1965. Even with a profit margin of 2.5 percent, the company"s earnings allowed Wackenhut to live lavishly in homes scattered throughout the country.
Prior to his move to Vero Beach, Florida in 1995, his primary residence was "Tyecliffe Castle", in Coral Gables, near Miami.
lieutenant was known in the Miami as Castle Wackenhut. lieutenant was a $10 million ($155 million today) turreted mansion complete with moat, decorated with firearms and medieval suits of armor. The 18,000 sq ft, 57 room Tyecliffe Castle was sold to Allen Stanford and was demolished c.2008.
His house was wired with infrared and laser sensors, closed-circuit television monitors and photo-cell surveillance and had private radios for his family.
In 1994, The Quiet American, an 800-page authorized biography of Wackenhut by John Minahan, was published. George Wackenhut was known as a hard-line right-winger.
He built up dossiers on Americans suspected of being Communists or left-leaning "subversives and sympathizers" and sold the information to interested parties. Frank Donner claimed in his book Age of Surveillance that the Wackenhut Corporation maintained and updated its files even after the McCarthy hysteria had ebbed, adding the names of antiwar protesters and civil rights demonstrators to its list of "derogatory types." By 1965, Wackenhut was boasting to potential investors that the company maintained files on 2.5 million suspected dissidents - one in 46 American adults then living.
In 1975, after the United States Congress investigated companies that had private files, Wackenhut gave its files to the now-defunct anti-Communist Church League of America of Wheaton, Illinois.
When he sold his company for $570 million in 2002 ($750 million today), he owned more than 50 percent of its stock. Wackenhut died on 31 December 2004 of heart failure, at his home in Vero Beach, Florida, at the age of 85.
Member law enforcement county National Council Crime and Delinquency, 1971-1973;board directors Heart Association of Greater Miami, 1965-1966, Governor's War on Crime, Florida, 1967-1970. Board visitors United States Army Member of Parliament School, 1972-1974. Member Small Business Administration Region IV, Miami Advisory Council, since 1983, National Council Trustees Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge, since 1989.
Member of national board directors National.Soccer Hall of Fame, since 1993. With United States Army, 1941-1945. Member Society Former Special Assemblies of God Theological Seminary Federal Bureau of Investigation, Inc., American Society for Industrial Security, Certified Protection Professional, American Institute of Management (president county 1964-1966), Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge (George Washington Honor medal, trustee), Ocean Reef Club (Key Largo, Florida), 200 Club Greater Miami.
Married Ruth Johann Bell, April 8, 1944. Children: Janis Lynn Wackenhut Ward, Richard Russell.