Louis B. Mayer

Louis B. Mayer was a Canadian-American film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. He was born in Minsk, Russian Empire (now Belarus) in 1884 and immigrated to Canada with his family in 1886. He grew up in Saint John, New Brunswick, where he worked as a scrap metal dealer and a theater manager. He moved to the United States in 1907 and started his own production company in 1917. He merged his company with Metro Pictures and Goldwyn Pictures in 1924 to form MGM, which became the film industry's most prestigious and profitable movie studio. He was known for his talent in discovering and developing stars, such as Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Judy Garland, and Mickey Rooney. He also produced many successful and acclaimed films, such as Ben-Hur, Grand Hotel, The Wizard of Oz, and Gone with the Wind. He was a powerful and influential figure in Hollywood, but also a controversial and tyrannical one. He was notorious for his temper, his control over his actors' private lives, and his conservative politics. He was forced to resign from MGM in 1951, after a series of conflicts with the studio's parent company, Loew's Inc. He died of heart failure in 1957 at the age of 73. He was buried in Home of Peace Cemetery in East Los Angeles. He left behind a legacy of innovation and excellence in the film industry.