1. Luca Pacioli (c. 1445-1517)
“A person should not go to sleep at night until the debits equal the credits.” So said the 15th-century ‘father of accounting’ Luca Pacioli, an Italian monk and mathematics teacher who famously worked with the artist Leonardo da Vinci. In 1494, he published Summa de Arithmetica, which included the first recorded detail of double-entry bookkeeping – a system still used by accountants today. Though the method had most likely been in use long before this, Pacioli was the first to publish extensive work on it, along with other key elements of modern accounting such as debits and credits, journals and ledgers, financial statements, year-end closing and ethics. Today, International Accounting Day takes place on 10 November, commemorating the date Summa de Arithmetica was published.
2. Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795)
Josiah Wedgwood is famous for founding a pottery company and being Charles Darwin’s grandfather – but he is also considered the world’s first cost accountant. A leader in the Industrial Revolution, he founded Wedgwood in 1759 and quickly started making big profits. But, when a financial crisis hit in the early 1770s and demand dropped, he began looking more closely at the bottom line. He tracked fixed and variable costs, understanding how elements such as materials, labour, storage, transportation and breakages could impact costs, and therefore prices and profit, as well as fundamental concepts such as economies of scale. (He also quickly discovered that his head clerk was embezzling money from the company.) Thanks to his pioneering accounting system, Wedgwood survived, and is still thriving today.
3. William Welch Deloitte (1818-1898)
The first of the ‘Big Four’ accountancy firm founders, William Welch Deloitte started his career early – at just 15 he became an assistant at the Bankruptcy Court in the City of London. By the age of 27, he had founded the global firm that still bears his name today. In 1849, he was appointed the first independent auditor of the Great Western Railway and became a specialist in railway accounts, famously exposing the notorious fraudster Leopold Redpath, who embezzled over £250,000 from the Great Northern Railway – the equivalent of about £20 million today. Deloitte became president of the newly created Institute of Chartered Accountants in 1888, and was the oldest practising accountant a year before his death in 1898.
4. JP Morgan (1837-1913)
American financier John Pierpont Morgan started his career as an accountant at a New York banking firm in 1857. Among his many legendary achievements, he formed a syndicate that bailed out the American banking system during the depression of the 1890s, and helped avert a stock market crash during the ‘Panic of 1907’. Morgan was responsible for founding many of America’s largest and longest-surviving multinational companies, including General Electric, US Steel and Western Union. He also founded the International Mercantile Marine Company, which owned the White Star Line – though he famously pulled out of Titanic’s ill-fated maiden voyage in 1912. He died a year later and, on the day of his funeral, the New York Stock Exchange suspended trading for two hours as a mark of respect.
5. Mary Harris Smith (1844-1934)
Mary Harris Smith was the first female chartered accountant in the world – but becoming a member of ICAEW was a lifelong journey. After leaving school at 16, and with university not an option for women at the time, she began her mathematics and accounting studies with private tutors. She started her own practice in 1887, and applied to join the Society of Incorporated Accountants and Auditors, but was rejected on the grounds of gender. In 1918, she became the first woman to pass ICAEW’s professional qualification, but was still not entitled to membership, despite her 30 years of professional experience. A year later the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act was passed, and in 1920 Mary finally became the world’s first female chartered accountant – at the age of 75.
6. Frank J Wilson (1887-1970)
In 1920s Prohibition-era Chicago, notorious gangster Al ‘Scarface’ Capone was making around $60 million a year from bootlegging, speakeasies and other illegal activities. Though he had been arrested several times on various charges, the authorities were unable to make a strong enough case to prosecute him. In the late 1920s, the US Treasury began investigating him for income tax evasion, enlisting a team of Internal Revenue Service forensic accountants headed by special agent Frank Wilson. After reputedly trawling through some two million financial records, Wilson and his team managed to trace payments to Capone that had not been declared as income. In 1931, Capone was convicted of federal tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years in prison, ending his reign as the city’s chief crime lord.
7. Itzhak Stern (1901-1969)
The 1993 film Schindler’s List tells the story of how German industrialist Oskar Schindler saved the lives of over 1,000 Jews during the Holocaust of the Second World War – but it was his accountant Itzhak Stern who was responsible for coming up with the idea in the first place. Stern, who worked as an accountant at Schindler’s enamelware company in Kraków, Poland, persuaded Schindler to use Jewish labour in his factory, protecting the lives of hundreds of Jews who would otherwise have been deemed nonessential and would most likely have been killed. Stern reputedly forged and falsified documents to make educated Jews appear to be experienced factory workers – as well as typing up that famous list of names.
8. Baroness Noakes (1949-)
“Colourful lady jumps ahead of grey men.” So announced The Times headline when Dame Sheila Masters was appointed the first female President of ICAEW in 1999. Born in 1949, she studied law at the University of Bristol before joining Peat Marwick Mitchell & Co (now KPMG) in 1970 – one of just four female trainees in an intake of 100. She qualified in 1973, winning multiple ICAEW prizes, and was made a partner 10 years later – only the second female in the firm to do so. During her career at KPMG, she was seconded to HM Treasury and the NHS before becoming chair of its international government practice. Masters was made a Dame in 1996 and a life peer as Baroness Noakes in 2000.