John Ruan has become a man of considerable impact and influence on a local, national, and more recently, international level.
As Chairman and CEO of The Ruan Companies, Ruan represents a diversified group of businesses with activities that include transportation, commercial banking, financial services, international trading and real estate development. He is a member of the Executive Committee and a member of the Policy & Finance Committee of the American Trucking Associations, Inc.; Trustee of the American Trucking Associations Foundation; a member of the Executive Committee of Northwestern University Transportation Center; a member of the Board of Governors of Iowa State University Foundation; Director of Living History Farms; and Trustee of Hoover Presidential Library Associations, Inc. He is also a member of the Business Advisory Group to the Governor of the State of Iowa.
Ruan also is Director of Edge Technologies, Inc., and past Director of Heritage Communications, Inc.; Northwestern Bell Telephone Co.; Northwestern States Portland Cement Company; Equitable of Iowa Co.; and Iowa Resources (now Mid American Energy). Ruan owns Bankers Trust Company, the largest independent bank in Iowa. In his native State of Iowa, where he was born in 1914, Ruan is a major contributor in business and the development of the Des Moines metropolitan area. In the early 1970's, Ruan built the 36 story Ruan Center to house the administration of the growing number of Ruan companies. Ruan built the 33-story Marriott Hotel in 1980 and the 14-story Two Ruan Center in 1982. He was active in the development and building of the Des Moines Convention Center in 1985 as well as several parking ramps in the downtown area.
Started in 1975, The John Ruan Multiple Sclerosis Golf Exhibition was one of the largest MS charity fund-raising events in the United States. Moneys raised from this annual event totalled well over $500,000, much of which supported ongoing research at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Lukes MS Clinic in Chicago, Illinois. Ruan also sponsors the Ruan Neurological Center at Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines, Iowa. One of the top-ranked facilities of its kind, the Center provides quality care for people around the globe.
Nationally, Ruan is well known for his trucking company. He began in 1932 with only one truck. This small business grew into Ruan Transportation Management Systems, which is now one of the nation's largest trucking operations (click to learn more about John Ruan's trucking and transportation business).
Internationally, Ruan founded the Iowa Export-Import Trading Company, a business involving over 50 nations around the world.
Ruan shares his success with his wife, the former Elizabeth Jayne Adams, two living children (one deceased), and their six grandchildren.
