Ralph Gerson

Ralph J. Gerson is the former Board Chairman of Guardian Industries Corp. He now serves as the Treasurer and a Board Director of the William Davidson Foundation. Mr. Gerson is also a private investor. From 1990 until 2011 Mr. Gerson served as Executive Vice President of Guardian Industries Corp. and President and CEO of Guardian International. Guardian manufactures float glass and a wide range of fabricated glass products for the residential and commercial construction industries. rom 1985 to 1987. His practice was in the areas of international trade and finance, corporate, and legislative law. From 1983 to 1985, he was appointed Director of Commerce for the State of Michigan. He also served as Chairman of the Michigan Cabinet Council on Jobs and Economic Development. From 1977 to 1980, Mr. Gerson served as Counselor to Ambassador Robert S. Strauss in the office of the President’s Personal Representative to the Middle East Peace Negotiations, and Special Assistant in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. In those positions, he worked on the Autonomy Negotiations, which resulted from the Camp David Accords, and on the Multilateral Trade Negotiations, which resulted in the Trade Agreements Act of 1979. Mr. Gerson, an alumnus of Yale, received a master's degree from the London School of Economics. At Michigan, he also was an editor of The Law Review. He ‘was formerly counsel to the Democratic National Committee and the 1976 Democratic Convention. His father is president of Say‐On Drugs Inc. of Birmingham, Mich., and a director and co‐owner of the Detroit Pistons professional basketball team. Mr. Gerson serves as Vice Chairman of the Business Council for International Understanding (BCIU) in New York. He further serves as Vice-President of the United Jewish Foundation of Metropolitan Detroit, an Officer-at-Large and Director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, a Director of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan, a Director of the Detroit Institute of Arts and an International Board Member of the Weizmann Institute of Science. He also is a Board Member of The Henry Ford and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.