When he was growing up in the 1930s in Jefferson City, Mo., then home to 23,000 people, his schoolmates called him Johnny. Slightly large hands and feet gave him a strong backstroke on the high school swimming team, recalls Boeing Chairman T.A. Wilson, a freestyler on the same squad. Johnny's father "Gump" ran a local hardware store. Years later, when the boy began making it big in business, a reporter for the local newspaper went out to see Gump and asked whether he was surprised by his son's success.
"No," said Gump, "I always...
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