Gary Dahl

Described as a "marketing genius" as well as a "genial mountebank", Gary Dahl, an award-winning copywriter, creative director, advertising agency owner, and entrepreneur, is best known in history for this fact: in 1975, he invented the pet rock. His life was never the same again. In 1988, he told the Associated Press: "Sometimes I look back and wonder if my life wouldn't have been simpler if I hadn't done it."