Paul-Louis Weiller

Paul-Louis Weiller (September 29, 1893, Paris - December 6, 1993, Geneva) was a French industrialist and philanthropist. Biography From a Jewish Alsatian family, Weiller was the son of the industrialist and politician Lazare Weiller (1858–1928) and Alice Anna Javal (1869–1943), scion of the Javal family, who rose to prominence in business, finance, and politics during the 19th century. His maternal grandfather was Louis Émile Javal. Through his mother he was the cousin of Louise Weiss and Jenny Aubry. Weiller studied engineering at the École Centrale Paris and graduated in 1914 with a graduate diploma. He later became an aviation hero during the First World War. Using aerial photography during his reconnaissance flights, he was shot down on several occasions and wounded. Receiving 12 honorable citations from the army, he was made an officer in the Legion of Honor at the age of 25 (the youngest officer in the Legion of Honor to be so awarded after Georges Guynemer and René Fonck), he finished the war next to maréchal Foch and was present at the signing of the Treaty of Versailles as an aide-de-camp to the allied armies. A business leader from the age of 29 (from 1922 to 1940), Weiller developed the most important airplane engine factory in Europe, Gnome et Rhône, which became Snecma S. A. after nationalization in 1945. From 1925, he progressively purchased capital in the aviation company CIDNA. He also participated in the creation of airlines serving Africa, which were all nationalized in 1933 to become Air France, of which he was one of the company's first administrators (in 1933, he was offered the post of president of Air France by Pierre Cot, the then ministre de l'Air, but refused the offer).