William Edward Boeing was an American aviator and businessman who established the Boeing Company in 1916. Originally from Michigan, Boeing hailed from an affluent immigrant family. At the age of eight, he lost his father, and his mother married a second time. He then left for Europe to study at a school in Vevey, Switzerland. After he permanently returned to US, he started attending Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1903, he dropped out and joined the lumber business, where his father had made money after immigrating to US from Germany. After settling in the Pacific Northwest at Hoquiam, Washington, he bought large timberlands around Grays Harbor on the Olympic Peninsula and ventured into lumber operations. Boeing developed an interest in aviation during a visit to Seattle in 1909. Along with George Conrad Westervelt, he set up the business venture B & W in 1916 and established Pacific Aero Products Co. After US joined the First World War, Boeing renamed the company Boeing Airplane Company. In 1927, he founded Boeing Air Transport. In the next few years, it merged with several other airlines to form United Air Lines.
