The Legacy of John C. Bogle: Innovator and Advocate

Abstract

As a student at Princeton University, John C. Bogle wrote his senior thesis on the mutual fund industry, which led to a job at Wellington Management Company. Bogle quickly climbed the ranks and led Wellington into a merger that, despite early success, soon failed. Bogle was fired as CEO of Wellington. From this calamitous career setback, Bogle rose phoenix-like from the ashes to start Vanguard. Bogle’s first major strategic move at Vanguard was the creation of the first index mutual fund. Both Vanguard and the index fund struggled to gain traction at first, but Bogle’s optimism and “missionary zeal” for low-cost investing never wavered. Once derided as “Un-American” and “settling for average,” indexing eventually caught on with investors and has now gained wide acceptance, with Bogle serving as indexing’s most prominent advocate for decades. In the latter part of his career, Bogle became the conscience of the industry, tirelessly advocating for reforms that would serve the interests of investors.