Alfred Lowenstein

Alfred Lowenstein (March 11, 1877 - July 4, 1928), CB, was a Belgian soldier, aviator, sportsman, and one of the most powerful businessmen during the early decades of the 20th century.

Early life and business career

Born in Brussels, Belgium, he was a wealthy man by the time World War I erupted in Europe. He joined the Belgian armed forces and following the army's retreat, Captain Alfred Lowenstein was sent to London, England where he was placed in charge of military supplies. At war's end, he maintained a residence in England where he ran an investment business that made him one of Europe's most powerful financiers. He partnered with the Canadian-born investment house of Sir James Dunn in several business venture, the duo emerging with more than £1,000,000 profit from their 1920s investment in British Celanese alone.

Lowenstein was an owner of a successful stable of Thoroughbred steeplechase race horses. His horses won the 1926 and 1928 runnings of the Grand Steeple-Chase de Paris.

Business successes, disappearance, and theories

Business success in electric power

Lowenstein also made an enormous fortune providing electric power facilities for developing countries worldwide through his Belgian-based company, "Société Internationale d'Énergie Hydro-Électrique" (SIDRO). By the mid 1920s, Lowenstein's reputation was such that he was consulted by heads of state from around the globe. The British government made him a Companion in The Most Honourable Order of the Bath.

Disappearance in an airplane

In 1926, he established "International Holdings and Investments Limited" that raised huge amounts of capital from wealthy investors wishing to get aboard his bandwagon of success. However, Lowenstein was rebuffed in his attempt to take over a Canadian company called Brazilian Traction, Light, and Power, a huge operation building infrastructure in Brazil. While flying on his private aircraft across the English Channel, Lowenstein went to the rear of the plane to use the lavatory. After a noticeable length of time passed, one of his employees went to check on him and reported that Lowenstein had vanished from the plane. The employee (along with the others on the plane) asserted that they believed Lowenstein had fallen through the plane's rear door and had plunged several thousand feet to his death in the English Channel.

News, theories, and recovery of the body

News of Lowenstein's demise caused panic selling in his corporations' publicly traded shares that immediately plummeted in value by more than fifty percent. His body was recovered a few weeks later; an autopsy was performed (at the request of his family) and it revealed no evidence of foul play.

Many theories have been put forward as to exactly what had happened to Lowenstein in the back of his plane; some suspected a criminal conspiracy in which his employees murdered him. The "New York Times" hypothesised that a growing absent mindedness, noted by many of Lowenstein's acquaintances, may have caused him to walk out the wrong door of the plane. Because he had left behind a tangled web of business ventures, many of which were highly leveraged, others theorized that his business empire was on the verge of collapse. Some even asserted that corrupt business practices were about to be exposed and that Lowenstein, therefore, committed suicide. None of these theories was ever proved.

In 1987, William Norris wrote Lowenstein's story in a book titled "The Man Who Fell From the Sky".

ee also

* Aviation accidents and incidents
* Financiers
* Companion in The Most Honourable Order of the Bath
* List of people who died in aviation-related incidents

External links

* [http://www.planecrashinfo.com/famous1920s.htm Lowenstein listed among famous people who died in aviation accidents in the 1920s]