Presenting 2026 Hotelie Hall of Fame Story - Curt Strand '43

Published on August 10, 2026

An excerpt from Curt's story...

Curt Strand, retired chairman and CEO of Hilton International was one of the most successful and influential CEO’s in lodging in modern history.

Born 1920 in Vienna, Strand and his family fled Austria and settled in the United States in 1937.

“My father had the idea that I should get some American experience and coincidentally at that time as I went out to go to the U.S., Adolf Hitler came into Austria. So we went across and that was also a good thing. But I really came here to do some work, which I did.  I first moved to Minnesota because my father had connections there and I was sent to work at Hormel’s packinghouse, and they had a course for young people who were recent college graduates, which I was not a college graduate yet, but we worked various departments in the packing house which isn’t much fun. I was about 17.”  I was there two years and I really didn’t want to make this my career.

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