Charles Baker Finch was an American businessman and lawyer
Background
The descendant of early English and Dutch pilgrims, Charles Finch was the second son of Henry Le Roy Finch and Mary Farquhar Baker and the grandson of Stephen Baker, President of the Bank of the Manhattan Company. Finch grew up in Manhattan and attended the Buckley School and Phillips Academy, where he was awarded the George Lauder Prize for Excellence in English History prior to his graduation in 1937.
Education
He attended Yale University (Bachelor, 1941) and Yale Law School (Bachelor of Laws, 1944), where he was comment editor of the law review the Yale Law Journal.
Career
He served as President and Chief Executive Officer of Allegheny Power System from 1971 to 1985. He had three brothers: Henry Leroy Finch Junior., Stephen Baker Finch and John Finch. After graduating from law school, Finch argued multiple cases before the United States Supreme Court.
He eventually joined Allegheny Power System where he was elected President and Chief Executive Officer in 1971.
He later also became Chairman of the Board at Allegheny. He served as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman until he was succeeded by Klaus Bergman as Chief Executive Officer in 1985.
Finch continued to serve as Chairman at Allegheny for several years. Finch sat on the boards of dozens of foundations, colleges, and companies, notable among them the Josiah Macy, Junior Foundation and Cooper Union, where a lab is named after him.
He was elected president of the New York City Mission in 1956 and served in that role for three years.
He was also involved in politics, which landed him on the master list of Nixon political opponents. Finch married Angela Havens of Hewlett, New York in 1943. Their son Charles B. Finch, Junior., born in 1954, made a brief run for the United States Congress in 1984 and also ran for New York"s 15th congressional district on the East Side of Manhattan in 1986.
Their second son, William Finch, was born in 1956.
He is the grandfather of author Charles Finch.