death_date birth_place birth_date gender article_title education name occupation
1957 ossining , new york , u.s. 1881 male wilbur b. foshay
 columbia university wilbur foshay entrepreneur
wilbur b. foshay

wilbur b. foshay was an american businessman , who built a fortune buying utilities throughout the midwest in the early 20th century .
foshay had built up three different utility company empires ; selling each one in turn to fund the acquisition phase of the next .
his second empire included three utility companies that served the crookston , bemidji , and hallock areas in northern minnesota -lrb- all are today served by otter tail power company -rrb- .
as he worked on his third and largest utility empire , foshay built the foshay tower in minneapolis , minnesota , which opened in august 1929 .
in 1932 he was convicted of conducting a `` pyramid scheme '' with shares of his own stock .
he was sentenced to 15 years in prison .
president franklin roosevelt commuted 10 years from foshay 's sentence , but foshay only actually served three years in leavenworth because of `` good behavior . ''
president harry truman granted foshay a full and unconditional pardon in 1947 .
