Jack McDonald: Teacher, Mentor, And A Sharp Investing Mind

The other day, I started reading Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings by Philip A. Fisher. This is one of the recommended classic books by many value investors and at Columbia, if you take Applied Value Investing course by Tom Tryforos, a big portion of the course is based on Fisher’s framework.

In an introduction written by Philip’s son Kenneth, he talks about how his father was one of the only 3 people who taught a popular investing course at Stanford: Fisher was an adjunct professor there for 2 years, followed by Jack McDonald who went on to be the professor teaching the longest at Stanford Graduate School of Business (he taught his course for 50 years before his death in 2018).

I didn’t know Jack McDonald: but then, there’s no surprise there as I’m not a long-time investor veteran. I got curious and wanted to learn more about him.

After some Google searches, I found this page which is essentially a tribute to this long-time teacher including a video.

He taught over 10,000 MBA and Executive Education students over a remarkable 50-year career at Stanford Graduate School of Business, and eventually passed away on Jan. 26, 2018 at Stanford Hospital in Palo Alto. He was 80 years old.

I was really touched by the video as many well-known investors over the years talked about how impactful he’d been in their lives and how he’d made them a better investor.

There is such a joy in nurturing and helping bright, young minds and Jack McDonald did it for 50 years.

 

Photo Credit: Stanford Graduate School of Business