Dave Thomas (businessman)
- See the David Thomas disambiguation page for other people with this name.
Rex David "Dave" Thomas (July 2, 1932 – January 8, 2002) was an American businessman and philanthropist. Thomas was the founder and chief executive officer of Wendy's Old Fashioned Hamburgers, a fast-food restaurant chain specializing in hamburgers. He is also known for personally appearing in 652 commercial advertisements for the chain from 1989 to 2002 – more than any other person in television history.
Thomas was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He never knew or met either of his birth parents. He was adopted by a Lebanese (this is disputed) family in Michigan as an infant; he would become a well-known advocate for adoption, founding the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption in 1992. His adoptive mother's name was Minnie Sinclair. She called herself his "adoptive grandmother" because she was an elderly woman by the time of his adoption.
He dropped out of high school at age 15. He moved in with the family that owned the Hobby House Restaurant and focused on ways to promote the restaurant.
During the Korean War, he volunteered for the army to avoid the draft and to have some choice in assignments. Having experience in overseeing the feeding of others, Thomas chose Cook and Bakers School at Fort Benning, Georgia. He was sent overseas to Germany as a mess sergeant and was responsible for feeding 2000 soldiers daily. He later attributed his success in fast food to this experience in mass feedings. Thomas was discharged in 1953 as a staff sergeant.
He was then offered a chance to turn around a failing Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant. Working with KFC founder Col. Harland Sanders, Dave turned four ailing stores into million-dollar successes. He later sold his KFC franchises and opened his first Wendy's in Columbus, Ohio, in 1969.
Thomas, realizing that his success as a high school dropout might convince other teenagers to leave school (something he later admitted was a mistake), studied for and finally earned his GED in 1993.
Thomas died in 2002 at his home in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, after a decade-long struggle with liver cancer. He was buried in Union Cemetery in Columbus, Ohio. At the time of his death, there were over 6,000 Wendy's restaurants operating in North America.
the greatest man of all time