Person
Ernest Oppenheimer
Mining businessman; founded Anglo American and chaired De Beers from 1929.
Connections 4
founded
- Anglo American 1917 Scholarship & press 12
chair of
board member of
involved in
- Wartime dispute over industrial diamonds De Beers chairman; argued a U.S. surplus would unsettle the market after the war; agreed to sell one million carats Scholarship & press 1
Timeline 3 dates
- 1917 Ernest Oppenheimer founded Anglo American
- 1926 Ernest Oppenheimer board member of De Beers
- 1929 Ernest Oppenheimer chair of De Beers
Proof 2 sources
-
Why a Diamond Means Forever: The Creation of the Diamond Engagement Ring Tradition in the United States, 1939-1996, Jennifer Lynn Pequignot, doctoral dissertation, Auburn University (drawing on the N. W. Ayer records at the Smithsonian), 2019.
Scholarship & press
In 1917 he established the Anglo-American Corporation.
In 1929 he became the chairman of the company.
He was also appointed to its board of directors.
Oppenheimer eventually agreed to sell the United States one million carats of industrial diamonds, a mere fraction of the original amount requested.
He argued that if the United States had a surplus stockpile of diamonds once the war ended, it could sell these diamonds on the open market, making the international diamond market unstable.
By 1943 the apparent shortage crisis had passed
-
Our History & Heritage Since 1888, De Beers Group.
Self-published
Sir Ernest Oppenheimer is elected to the De Beers Board after Anglo American, the company he founded, becomes a major shareholder in De Beers.
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