Allen B. Gellman*
Class of 1956
- President Elgin-American Company
When I came to America from Hungary, I saw opportunity everywhere I looked even though it was the height of the Depression.
Allen Gellman was born in Fegyvernek, Hungary, in 1906. He immigrated to the United States in 1930, at the age of 24, and became a naturalized citizen in 1939.
Gellman received little education but traveled from one end of the United States to the other as an itinerant machine operator. He studied business administration at Northwestern School of Commerce in the evenings and studied engineering at the Lewis Institute of Technology.
A bank executive became interested in Gellman's metalworking and machine improvements and hired him to direct the bank. Ten years after landing in America, he was a partner in his own firm and had become an expert in industrial design.
Gellman held many patents and eventually became president of the Elgin-American Company, the world's largest manufacturer of jewelry and accessories.