Estée Lauder

Born Josephine Esther Mentzer on July 1, 1908, she co-founded her cosmetics company with her husband Joseph Lauter, who later changed his surname to Lauder. She built the business by hand, relying on direct selling and the power of letting customers try before they bought. By 1998, Time magazine named her to its list of the 20 most influential business geniuses of the 20th century — she was the sole woman among them. She died April 24, 2004, decades after proving that a woman with jars of cream and a strategy could rewrite an industry.