Spoiled Children of Divorce

Another member of Time Magazine’s list of exceptional people: Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame.

Bezos was born as Jeffrey Preston Jorgenson on January 12,1964 in Albuquerque, NM. His Mother was sixteen. Both parents were still in High School and eloped to Mexico in order to get married when his Mother became pregnant. His Father owned a bike shop and maybe had a problem with alcohol. Mom filed for divorce in June 1965 and the divorce was final when Bezos was 17 months old (depending on which source you read. Also look at USAToday article). According to the USAToday article Bezos’ Father dropped out of his life soon after Bezos’ Mother remarried. His Father relinquished parenthood so Bezos’ stepfather could adopt him. Bezos took on his step-/adopted Father’s last name. His bio Father didn’t even know who Bezos was until 2012. He still owns Bike Shops.

His Step-Father/Adopted Father, Miguel “Mike” Bezos, is an immigrant from Cuba. He worked as an Engineer for Exxon. Jeff would spend some of his summers on his grandfather’s ranch in Texas.

Bezos has a younger brother, Mark. He was educated in Montessori schools.

Bezos entered Princeton early when he got a degree in something technical. (sorry, too lazy to look it up). He married a colleague in 1993 at age 29. The couple have 3 boys and a daughter who was adopted from China.

Amazon.com was started in 1994 and funded by parents. Bezos is now considered the Richest Man in the World.

Interesting coincidences with Elon Musk. Bezos is working on a spaceflight business in Texas called Blue Origin. He has loved spaceflight since he was 5. I think I read he is an avid StarWars fan. Like Musk he is known to have some emotional problems which the employees call going “Nutters.”

Bezos is a not known as a great employer. Amazon has one of the highest turn around rates of large companies.