By Daniel Nasaw
Jeb Bush will be a candidate for president during the 2016 election, but the Bushes and their relatives have been at the heart of American business and politics for more than a century. Through five wealthy and powerful generations, the families of George Herbert Walker Bush and Barbara Pierce have produced investment bankers, a magazine publishing executive, a state supreme court justice, a railroad industrialist, a senator, two governors, and, of course, two presidents. Now, Jeb Bush hopes to be the third. Take a look at the faces below to explore the Bush family tree with their profile below.
Samuel Prescott Bush
- Born 1863
- Died 1948
- Married to Flora Sheldon
Samuel Bush was the first of the
family’s modern era to achieve wealth. Born in New Jersey, he got an
engineering degree from the Stevens Institute of Technology and began a
long career in the railroad industry. His work brought him to Ohio,
where he settled in Columbus and eventually rose to become president of
Buckeye Steel Castings, an industrial manufacturer. A Democrat, Samuel
Bush served as president of the National Association of Manufacturers,
was a charter member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and founded an
anti-tax group.
Flora Sheldon
- Born 1872
- Died 1920
- Married to Samuel Prescott Bush
Flora Sheldon, the daughter of a
Columbus merchant and banker, married Samuel Bush in 1894. She was
killed in a car accident in 1920.
George Herbert Walker
- Born 1874
- Died 1953
- Married to Loulie Wear
George Herbert Walker was an
investment banker who founded the family vacation home in Kennebunkport,
Me., where the first President Bush entertained world leaders. He was
born in St. Louis to a successful Catholic family and educated in
Britain. He founded a firm in St. Louis and later moved his family to
New York to run W. A. Harriman & Co., a precursor to Brown Brothers
Harriman. Mr. Walker enjoyed the New York high life -- he owned Rolls
Royces, ate and drank lavishly and employed two butlers. As president of
the U.S. Golf Association, he donated the trophy for the Walker Cup
competition.
Loulie Wear
- Born 1874
- Died 1961
- Married to George Herbert Walker
Loulie Wear was born in St. Louis,
Mo., and married George Herbert Walker in 1899. A biographer of the Bush
family describes her as patient in the face of her husband's foul
temper, criticism and domineering manner.
James Robinson
- Born 1868
- Died 1932
- Married to Lula Flickinger
Born to settlers of Union County,
Ohio, James Robinson was a prominent lawyer who rose to become a justice
of the Ohio Supreme Court. After his death, he was eulogized by his
colleagues on the bar as having a “high and comprehensive conception of
the judicial function and a generous understanding of the fundamental
principles on which our American institutions rest.”
Lula Flickinger
- Born 1875
- Married to James Robinson
Prescott Sheldon Bush
Investment Banker, U.S. Senator
- Born 1895
- Died 1972
- Married to Dorothy Walker
Prescott Bush was born in Columbus and
moved east to attend St. George’s boarding school in Newport, R.I.
After graduating from Yale, Bush served as a captain in an artillery
unit in World War I in France. Prescott Bush entered the investment
banking business, in 1931 becoming a partner at the newly formed Brown
Brothers Harriman & Co. After years in part-time local politics in
Greenwich, Conn., Bush was elected to the U.S. Senate as a Republican in
1952 to serve out the term of a Democrat who died. He was re-elected in
1956, and after a single full term retired to resume his career in
investment banking.
Dorothy Walker
- Born 1901
- Died 1992
- Married to Prescott Sheldon Bush
Born into privilege, Dorothy Walker
was educated at Miss Porter’s School in Connecticut. She married
Prescott Bush in 1921. She was a distinguished athlete and valued
self-effacement and good manners, once chastising her son, then vice
president, for reading the printed text as Ronald Reagan delivered a
speech.
Marvin Pierce
Magazine Publisher
- Born 1893
- Died 1969
- Married to Pauline Robinson
Marvin Pierce, a distant relation of
14th president Franklin Pierce, was a senior executive at the McCall
Corp., a publisher of women’s magazines. Like just about every other
figure on the Bush family tree, he was an accomplished athlete, winning
renown for his achievements at Miami University in Ohio. He settled in
Rye, N.Y., a tony suburb of New York. But his success was marred by
terrible tragedy – in September 1949, he ran his car off the road to the
train station. He was injured and his wife Pauline Robinson, Barbara
Pierce's mother, was killed. In June 1952, he married journalist Willa
Gray Martin.
Pauline Robinson
- Born 1896
- Died 1949
- Married to Marvin Pierce
Born in Ohio, Pauline Robinson met
Marvin Pierce while the latter was a student at Miami University and she
was studying to become a teacher. Pauline was described by a biographer
of Barbara Bush as a bit of a spendthrift who doted on Barbara’s elder
sister while treating her more coldly. In September 1949, Pauline was
riding to the train station with her husband so that she could drive the
car home after dropping him off, when a bone china coffee cup she had
placed on the seat between them began to tip. When Marvin Pierce reached
for the cup to steady it, the car ran off the side of the road and
crashed into a tree and a stone wall. He was injured and she was killed.
George Herbert Walker Bush
- Born June 12, 1924
- Married to Barbara Pierce
George Herbert Walker Bush grew up in
Greenwich, Conn., where his family had a driver and handyman, a cook,
and maids. At Phillips Academy prep school, he was a middling student
but a star athlete. He joined the Navy on his 18th birthday, trained as a
pilot and deployed to the Pacific, where his plane was shot down by
Japanese anti-aircraft fire. After Yale, he moved to Texas to enter the
oil business. In 1966 he was elected to the U.S. House of
Representatives. Later he was chairman of the Republican National
Committee, ambassador to the U.N., chief diplomat in China and director
of the Central Intelligence Agency. In 1980, he was elected vice
president under Ronald Reagan, and in 1988, president.
Barbara Pierce
- Born June 8, 1925
- Married to George Herbert Walker Bush
The first Bush first lady was born in
New York and raised in Rye, a Westchester County suburb. In 1941, she
met George H. W. Bush at a dance in Greenwich, Conn. They married in
January 1945. Barbara moved with George Bush as his career in the oil
business and later politics took him around the country and beyond. In
the White House, she devoted herself to promoting adult literacy. As
recently as 2013, Mrs. Bush seemed reluctant to throw herself behind her
son Jeb’s presidential ambitions, but in March 2015 her name was
attached to a Jeb Bush fundraising letter.
George Walker Bush
U.S. President, Texas Governor
- Born July 6, 1946
- Married to Laura Welch
George W. Bush was born in New Haven,
Conn. Raised in Texas, he followed his father and grandfather to Yale
and served in the Texas Air National Guard. After earning a business
degree from Harvard, he married Laura Welch, worked in the oil business
and was an owner of the Texas Rangers Major League Baseball team. Bush
was elected governor of Texas in 1994. In 2000, he was elected president
despite losing the popular vote to Vice President Al Gore. In 2004, he
was decisively re-elected.
Laura Welch
Former First Lady
- Born Nov. 4, 1946
- Married to George Walker Bush
The second Bush first lady hails from
Midland, Texas, where her husband also grew up. She worked as a school
teacher and librarian before marrying George W. Bush. The couple have
two daughters, twins Barbara and Jenna.
Robin Bush
- Born Dec. 20, 1949
- Died Oct. 11, 1953
Pauline Robinson “Robin” Bush died of
leukemia at age three, seven months after waking one morning pale and
lethargic with bruises on her legs. Her death devastated the family, and
in its aftermath, her mother Barbara Bush’s hair began to turn gray
though she was just 28 year old.
John Ellis "Jeb" Bush
- Born Feb. 11, 1953
- Married to Columba Garnica
Jeb Bush followed his father to
Phillips Academy in Andover. While on a study-abroad program in Mexico,
he met Columba Garnica Gallo. The couple married three years later. Bush
attended the University of Texas. Later, the family moved to Venezuela,
where he worked for a bank. He settled in Florida, where he worked for
his father's 1980 and 1988 presidential campaigns, in real estate and
banking, and served as Florida secretary of commerce under Gov. Bob
Martinez. He was elected governor on his second try, in 1998, and won
re-election in 2002. After leaving office in 2007, Bush returned to the
business world, serving on corporate boards and holding ownership stakes
in a consulting and investment firms.
Columba Garnica
- Born Aug. 17, 1953
- Married to John Ellis "Jeb" Bush
Columba Garnica de Gallo Bush hails
from Leon, Mexico, and met Jeb Bush while he was a student there. The
daughter of a farmer, she became a U.S. citizen in the 1980s. She shies
from the spotlight and takes on few of the public duties customary to a
political wife. As first lady of Florida, she became an advocate for
domestic abuse victims.
Neil Mallon Bush
Businessman
- Born Jan. 22, 1955
Named for Neil Mallon, his father’s
mentor in the oil business, Neil Bush settled in Colorado after working
on his father’s 1980 presidential campaign. He soon became embroiled in
the savings and loan scandal. The Silverado Banking, Savings and Loan
Association, of which he was an outside director, collapsed in 1988,
costing the government about $1 billion to bail out depositors. Neil
Bush and his partners ultimately agreed to pay $49.5 million to settle
an FDIC civil suit alleging negligence and insider dealings. Today Neil
Bush sits on corporate boards and is chairman of the Points of Light
Foundation, a non-profit founded by his father that promotes
volunteerism.
Marvin Pierce Bush
Businessman
- Born Oct. 22, 1956
The youngest of the Bush sons, Marvin
has also kept the lowest profile. He went to the University of Virginia
and has worked as a businessman, investment manager and corporate board
member. As his brother’s tenure in the White House ended, Marvin Bush
helped establish the George W Bush presidential library.
Doro Bush
- Born Aug. 18, 1959
The youngest child of President George
H.W. Bush, known as Doro, spent part of her adolescence in New York
City while her father was ambassador to the U.N. Bashful about her
family’s station, she was driven to school by a chauffeur but asked to
be dropped off down the street, according to a biography. She has a
sociology degree from Boston College. She lived for a time in Maine,
where she worked for the Maine tourism office, and later moved to
Washington, where she worked at a hospital.
Barbara Pierce Bush
- Born Nov. 25, 1981
Barbara Pierce Bush was seven when her
grandfather was sworn in as president, and 19 when her parents moved
into the Executive Mansion. At that point, she was a student at Yale,
the alma mater of her father, grandfather and great-grandfather. In 2008
she co-founded the non-profit Global Health Corps. On Inauguration Day
in January 2009, she and her twin sister, Jenna, penned an article in
The Wall Street Journal offering warm advice to the Obama girls (“Have
fun and enjoy your childhood in such a magical place to live and play”).
Jenna Welch Bush
- Born Nov. 25, 1981
Jenna Bush Hager was seven when her
grandfather was sworn in as president and 19, and a freshman at the
University of Texas when her parents moved into the White House. She was
married in 2008 to Henry Chase Hager, the son of a former Virginia
lieutenant governor, and in 2009 was hired as a special correspondent on
NBC’s “Today” show.
George Prescott Bush
Texas Land Commissioner
- Born April 24, 1976
George Prescott Bush was born in
Texas, attended Rice University in Houston, and later law school at the
University of Texas. He taught school in Miami, served as an officer in
the U.S. Navy reserve, worked in private equity and at an investment
firm, according to a campaign biography, before following his forbears
into politics. In November, he was elected Texas land commissioner.
Noelle Bush
- Born July 26, 1977
John Ellis Bush Jr
- Born Dec. 13, 1983
Photos: Getty Images, George Bush Presidential Library and Museum, Ohio Supreme Court, Ancestry.com/U.S. State Department, Stevens Institute of Technology
Source: http://graphics.wsj.com/jeb-bush-family-tree/?mod=e2tw
