J. Paul Getty 1892 – 1976

Biography

J. Paul Getty was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the son of an oilman, and studied at Oxford before entering the oil business. He built Getty Oil into one of America’s great independent oil companies, buying concessions in the Middle East and becoming, by the 1950s, one of the richest men in the world, famous for his frugality despite his fortune. He moved to England in the 1950s and lived at Sutton Place in Surrey, where he assembled one of the finest private art collections of his age, later forming the nucleus of the J. Paul Getty Museum in California. His grandson’s kidnapping in 1973 made headlines around the world. He died at Sutton Place, near Guildford, England, in 1976. The Getty Museum in Los Angeles, endowed by his fortune, is now one of the richest and most visited art museums in America.