Benjamin Graham was born in London in 1894 but moved with his family to New York City the next year. In 1914, Graham graduated second in class from Columbia University. He was then offered teaching assignments in Columbia's English, mathematics and philosophy departments.

Instead, Graham went to work on Wall Street. Ruined by speculation three times early on, Graham then devised his famous "margin of safety" approach, which meant buying stocks of companies that were cheap in relation to their net assets. This strategy worked well; in fact, the Graham-Newman partnership then averaged gains of 21% a year for the next two decades.

In 1928, Graham began teaching a popular investing class at Columbia. His most famous student was Berkshire Hathaway's Warren Buffett.

Graham's Security Analysis, co-authored with David Dodd, was published in 1934. Graham's The Intelligent Investor came out in 1949.

In the early 1960s, Graham helped found CFA program.

Outside of the office, Graham loved skiing, tennis and dancing. A student of the classics, Graham could also translate Portuguese, Greek and Latin. He died in 1976.

John Train writes in The Money Masters that Graham is "this century's (and perhaps history's) most important thinker on applied portfolio investment, taking it from an art, based on impressions, inside information, and flair, to a proto-science, an orderly discipline."