Personal+life+and+Education

= Personal Life and Education personal life =

Richard Branson was born July 18, 1950 in Surrey, a London suburb, to Ted and Eve Branson. Branson’s father, like his grandfather and great-grandfather, was a lawyer, and his mother was a former ballet instructor, glider pilot, and flight attendant. This combination undoubtedly made an impression on her young son, who would grow up to head a music label and airline, and develop a love of hot air ballooning and sky diving. Branson’s parents encouraged him to set high goals for himslf; in fact, his mother used to tell her friends that her son would become prime minister of England some day. As a boy, Branson was an avid athlete who often put more time into sports than studies. Bored with school, Branson set his sights on business as an adolescent, growing Christmas trees and breeding birds. His father, however, wanted him to study for college entrance exams and sent him to an exclusive boarding school. At the age of 15, Branson introduced //Student,// a liberal current events and culture magazine that he edited and published while attending Stowe. Before long, luminaries such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Alice Walker, and Robert Graves were submitting writings, and Branson landed interviews with famous figures such as actress Vanessa Redgrave, writer James Baldwin, and psychoanalyst R. D. Laing. When Branson dropped out of school at age 16 to devote himself to the periodical, his headmaster reportedly told him, “Branson, I predict that you will either go to prison or become a millionaire.” Branson’s first marriage in 1972 to American Kristen Tomassi ended in divorce. He later met Joan Templeman, with whom he had a son, Sam, and a daughter, Holly, they married in 1989. Though he affects a swashbuckling persona and flirtatious attitude, Branson is reportedly a devoted family man. In fact, one British poll named him, after Mother Theresa, the person most suitable to rewrite the Ten Commandments. Branson has a home in the Holland Park section of London and a country home in Oxfordshire, where he entertains the likes of Margaret Thatcher, Mick Jagger, and Boy George. In 1968, Branson founded the Help Advisory Centre, which gives counseling on birth control and sexually transmitted diseases. He is also involved in a number of other causes, including Parents Against Tobacco and AIDS education. In the late 1980s, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher named him chair of UK 2000, an environmental group. Though Branson began his career as a free-wheeling liberal journalist with //Student,//, his hippie days were numbered. “I never had any interest in being a businessman,” Branson commented in //Business Week.// “I started out wanting to edit this magazine. But the business side became all-important, and I realized that if I didn’t get all that sorted out, I wouldn’t be able to be an editor.” To help raise funds, he began selling advertising. Operating without an office or a phone, he would use a pay phone and convince operators that the slot took his coins but did not provide a connection. This way, he saved money and connected to potential clients without them hearing change clinking into the phone. []