PROPERTY FROM THE ESTATE OF REGINALD F. LEWIS (LOTS 247-256) Born to a working class family in Baltimore, Md., Mr. Lewis rose from humble beginnings to become one of the country's pre-eminent Wall Street dealmakers and was widely acknowledged as the wealthiest African-American in the U.S. After attending segregated grade schools, Mr. Lewis graduated from Virginia State University and Harvard Law School in 1968 and joined Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton and Garrison, a prominent corporate law firm in New York. Two years later, he founded his own law firm, Lewis and Clarkson, which eventually became a leading legal advisor in raising money for minority-owned business. In 1984, Mr. Lewis moved into finance, completing the leveraged buyout of McCall Pattern Company, which he sold four years later at a substantial profit. Within months of that deal, Mr. Lewis bought Beatrice International, a 64-company food conglomerate, for nearly a billion dollars, at the time the largest off-shore leveraged buyout in history and the nation's largest African American-owned business. Never forgetting his own humble beginnings, Lewis was a generous philanthropist. Through The Reginald F. Lewis Foundation, he gave millions to various charities, including $3 million to Harvard Law School to fund the Reginald F. Lewis International Law Center at that time the largest grant in the school's history. Mr. Lewis' career was cut short at age 50, when he passed away after a brief illness in 1993 and his widow, Loida Lewis, took over the company. Despite Wall Street skepticism, she stabilized the company was named the most powerful female chief executive in America, by Working Woman, the magazine, in 1995. Reginald F. Lewis' posthumous biography, based on his own writing, was a business bestseller. A variety of organizations have honored his legacy. In 2005, the state of Maryland opened The Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture, funded in part by a $5 million grant from his foundation, now overseen by family members. Mr. Lewis assembled an important collection of modern and African-American fine art and European Furniture. Furniture from the collection of Reginald Lewis will be offered in both Christie's sales of Important English furniture on October 11 and Important European furniture on October 19. The items on offer formed part of a larger group of furnishings selected by Mr. Lewis in collaboration with Juan Pablo Molyneux, the celebrated interior designer, for his Fifth Avenue apartment.

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY CHEST-OF-DRAWERS

CIRCA 1760

Details

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY CHEST-OF-DRAWERS
CIRCA 1760
The rectangular top above a brushing-slide and four graduated drawers flanked by blind fretwork-carved angles, on shaped bracket feet
30½ in. (77.5 cm.) high, 34 in. (86.5 cm.) wide, 19½ in. (49.5 cm.) deep

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