Louis Renault (industrialist)
| Louis Renault | |
|---|---|
| Born |
12 February 1877 Paris, France |
| Died | 24 October 1944 (aged 67) Fresnes Prison, Fresnes, Val-de-Marne, France |
| Nationality | French |
| Occupation | Business |
| Known for | co-founder of Renault |
| Home town | Paris, France |
| Relatives | Marcel Renault and Fernand Renault |
| Awards | Legion of Honor |
Louis Renault (French pronunciation: [ʁəno]; 12 February 1877 – 24 October 1944) was a French industrialist, one of the founders of Renault and a pioneer of the automobile industry.
Renault built one of France's largest automobile manufacturing concerns, which bears his name to this day. During World War I his factories contributed massively to the war effort notably so by the creation and manufacture of the first effective tank: the Renault FT tank.
Accused of collaborating with the Germans during World War II, he died while awaiting trial in liberated France toward the end of 1944 under uncertain circumstances. His company was seized and nationalized by the provisional government of France although he died before he could be tried. His factories were the only ones permanently expropriated by the French government.
In 1956, Time Magazine described Renault as "rich, powerful and famous, cantankerous, brilliant, often brutal, the little Napoleon of an automaking empire — vulgar, loud, domineering, impatient, he was a terror to associates, a friend to practically none," adding that to the French working man, Renault became known as "the ogre of Billancourt."
The fourth of six children born into the bourgeois Parisian family of Alfred and Berthe Renault, Louis Renault attended Lycée Condorcet. He was fascinated by engineering and mechanics from an early age and spent hours in the Serpollet steam car workshop or tinkering with old Panhard engines in the tool shed of the family's second home in Billancourt.
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