Peter Olson :::
Peter Olson
Graduated in 1968
Inducted in 1999
A 1968 graduate of LTHS, Peter Olson is a leader in the publishing business. He was named Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Random House, Inc. in 1998, when Bertelsmann AG, one of the world's largest media companies with more than 600 companies, acquired Random House. Random House is the largest English-language trade publishing company in the world. He oversees all the publishing divisions and imprints of the former Random House and Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Prior to the acquisition of Random House, Olson served as Chairman of the Bertelsmann Book Group in North America from 1995-1998. And from 1993 through March 1998, in addition to his responsibilities in North America, he was appointed to oversee Bertelsmann's English-language book club activities in international markets, including Asia. Before taking on the role of Chairman, he served as Chief Operating Officer of the Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group from 1992 to 1994 and was President of Bertelsmann, Inc., the U.S. corporate and administrative branch of Bertelsmann AG from 1990 to 1992. Prior to joining Bertelsmann, he was a banker in Japan and Germany; he began his career as a lawyer working in both Washington D.C. and Tokyo, Japan. Olson earned graduate degrees from the Harvard Law and Business schools in 1976 and also earned his bachelor's degree from Harvard in 1972, where he graduated magna cum laude. He is fluent in Russian and German.