Martha Stewart

Martha Stewart (born August 3, 1941) is a television and magazine personality known for her cooking, gardening, etiquette, and arts and crafts projects, and as a general lifestyle guide and homemaker. She is also a successful businesswoman and an American icon. Starting in 2002 her career was rocked by a scandal involving her sale of shares in a drug company days before its application for a new drug was denied. She was eventually convicted of lying to investigators and sentenced to prison in 2004. She was released on March 4, 2005. Her current projects include two new television series: Martha and '.

Early life

She was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, to Polish-American parents Edward Kostyra and Martha Ruszowski, but grew up in Nutley, New Jersey, with five brothers and sisters. She was christened Martha Helen Kostyra, and later took the name Grace at confirmation.

Related Topics:
Jersey City, New Jersey - Polish-American - Nutley, New Jersey

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A good student, she received a partial scholarship to Barnard College in New York City, and worked part-time as a model to help pay her expenses. She initially intended to major in chemistry but switched to European history, and architectural history. After graduation, she pursued her budding modelling career and starred in several television commercials. She stopped modelling in 1965 when she gave birth to daughter Alexis, with then-husband Andrew Stewart, a law student she met in college. Martha took her husband's surname as her professional name, although ironically it was not his original surname either; his Russian Jewish family had anglicized their original surname to Stewart.

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Barnard College - New York City - Model - Chemistry - European history - Architectural history - Television commercial - 1965 - Russian - Jewish

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After modelling, she began pursuing her second career as a stock broker, until 1973 when recession hit Wall Street. She and her husband then moved to Westport, Connecticut and began restoration of an 1805 farmhouse which is occasionally seen in her television programs (though she uses a stage environment for many shots) and where she still lives today. In later years, she began a successful catering business out of her home and began writing columns and articles on topics such as cooking, gardening, and home furnishing. During the 1980s, she was a contributing editor to Family Circle magazine and became a spokesperson for Kmart in 1987. In 1990, she started her own magazine, Martha Stewart Living. That same year, her husband filed for divorce on the same day that her book on weddings was released.

Related Topics:
Stock broker - 1973 - Wall Street - Westport, Connecticut - 1805 - Television program - Catering - 1980s - Family Circle - Kmart - 1987 - 1990 - Magazine - Martha Stewart Living - Weddings

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