Cofounder of athletic-shoe company , born in 1938 in Portland, Oregon. Knight ran under famed track coach Bill Bowerman at the University of Oregon, where Knight was a guinea pig for some of the coach鈥檚 homegrown footwear designs. (See Bowerman, Bill.) Later, Knight enrolled in Stanford鈥檚 business school and worked on a plan to sell Japanese running shoes. Knight formed with Bowerman to execute his concept, securing a contract with . Soon the duo began marketing Bowerman鈥檚 creations under the Nike name, introducing the 聽at the 1972 Olympic trials and signing to wear them in 1974. Nike was recently ranked the most valuable apparel brand in the world.
(Photo: Tim Tomkinson)
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