Martha Stewart is a Japanese American media personality best known for her television show and magazine, Martha Stewart Living.
Martha Stewart Biography
Martha Stewart was born on August 3, 1941, in Jersey City, New Jersey. Stewart rose to prominence as an author of books on cooking, entertaining, and decorating. She later expanded her brand to include a magazine and television show, as CEO of Martha Stewart Omnimedia. Stewart resigned from her position in 2002 following insider trading charges for which she was later convicted.
Lifestyle Guru
Martha Stewart, a lifestyle guru and businesswoman, was born Martha Kostyra on August 3, 1941, in New Jersey. The second of her six children, Stewart grew up in Nutley, New Jersey, a working-class community near New York City. She worked as a model starting at age 13, appearing in fashion shows as well as television and print commercials.
Stewart attended Barnard College in Manhattan, where she graduated in 1962 with a degree in European history and architecture. At Barnard, she met Andy Stewart, a Yale law student, and the two married in 1961. Six years later, after the birth of their daughter Alexis, Stewart went to work as a stockbroker for the boutique firm Monness, Williams and Sidel. She worked on Wall Street until 1972, when the family moved to Westport, Connecticut.
After the Stewarts restored the 19th-century farmhouse they had purchased, Martha decided to focus her energies on gourmet cooking. She had trained herself by reading Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. She started a catering business in the late 1970s and quickly became known for her gourmet menus and unique, creative presentation. Within ten years, Martha Stewart, Inc. had grown into a million-dollar company that served a number of corporate and celebrity clients.
Stewart expanded into the publishing world with her first book, Entertaining, which became a bestseller and was quickly followed by publications such as Martha Stewart’s Quick Cooking Menus, Martha Stewart’s Hors d’Oeuvres, Martha Stewart’s Christmas, and Martha Stewart’s Wedding Planner. Her newfound fame took a toll on her personal life, as her marriage to Andy Stewart ended in divorce in 1990 after a bitter three-year separation.
In 1991, Martha Stewart, Inc., became Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. with the publication of her magazine, Martha Stewart Living. Stewart’s lifestyle empire quickly grew to include two magazines, a cash register recipe publication, a popular cable television show, a syndicated newspaper column, a series of how-to books, a radio show, a website, and annual retail sales of $763 million.
On October 19, 1999, America’s most famous housewife returned to Wall Street to see her company go public on the New York Stock Exchange. In the end, the price of each of the 72 million shares of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Inc. had jumped more than 95% and raised nearly $130 million. Stewart herself controls 96% of the voting stock of her company and is worth $1.2 billion.
Insider Trading Scandal
In June 2002, Stewart was once again in the financial news, this time due to rumors of insider trading. Stewart was under investigation for selling hundreds of shares of ImClone Systems just before the Food and Drug Administration’s refusal to approve the company’s new cancer drug. The stock’s value declined sharply after the FDA’s announcement. As a result of the investigation, Stewart resigned from the New York Stock Exchange board in October, just four months after taking office.
In June 2003, a 41-page indictment was issued charging her with securities fraud, obstruction of justice, conspiracy, and making false statements to prosecutors and the FBI. She pleaded innocent to all charges and resigned as president and CEO of her Omnimedia empire. In February 2004, a judge dismissed the securities fraud charge, but a jury convicted her of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and two counts of making false statements. Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months in prison and fined $30,000 in July. She served the first part of her sentence at a minimum-security prison in Alderson, West Virginia, in October 2004.
Martha Stewart Later career
Stewart was released from prison on March 4, 2005, just after NBC announced that she would host two new shows: a daytime talk show and a show-and-tell show, as well as a spin-off of the reality series The Apprentice, produced by Mark Burnett and Donald Trump. Stewart completed her sentence by serving a five-month house arrest at her home in Bedford, New York.
While Martha Stewart’s version of The Apprentice failed to attract enough viewers, her self-proclaimed daily show has been on the air since 2005. The company she founded, Martha Stewart Omnimedia, has continued to grow. The company has added several non-Martha Stewart publications, including Everyday Food and Body + Soul.
Professional misfortunes
Stewart’s syndicated show moved to the Hallmark Channel in 2010, but it failed to build a large enough audience to support the expensive-to-produce program. Hallmark canceled the show in 2012 due to low ratings. That fall, Stewart launched a new series on PBS called Martha Stewart’s Cooking Class.
In 2013, Stewart found herself in a courtroom again. Her company was locked in a lawsuit with the department store chain Macy’s over a contract dispute. Macy’s sued Stewart and retail rival J.C. Penney over Stewart’s plans to open Martha Stewart-branded boutiques in Penney’s stores.
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