We so often see Ross in the red, white and blue colors of an earlier America. Deservedly so. Here are notes from his Horatio Alger life story: Texarkana newspaper boy; midshipman shaking lands with Dwight Eisenhower at graduation; leading salesman for IBM, fulfilling his sales quota for the year on Jan. 2; Fortune cover boy as the nation's first tech entrepreneur; advocate for Vietnam POWs; honored by the nation's Joint Chiefs of Staff for working to make sure every American wounded in combat received the health care treatment needed; independent candidate for president of the United States garnering the most popular votes ever by a independent candidate for the highest office in the land; humanitarian and philanthropist; devoted husband to the love of his life Margot; father to five wonderful children and 16 grandchildren. It is as if he stepped out of a Norman Rockwell painting and lived the American Dream.
Image: Electronic Data Systems S. Ross Perot, shows off the control of the company's newest information Processing Center in Auburn Hills, Mich., north of Detroit July 11, 1985. (The Associated Press)
