He dropped out of high school to apprentice for a London shoe importer run by an old family friend.

FORBES: British Billionaire Philip Green Strikes Deal With J. Crew, Neiman Marcus Investor; Aims For Big U.S. Expansion

But he will soon be getting some advice from an old family friend whose counsel will be hard to ignore.

NPR: Baker and Hamilton See Iraq's Future

Business plan and projections in hand, I went back to one of my lead investors, JM, an old family friend who runs a hedge fund.

FORBES: The Three Biggest Hurdles To Launching My Business

It all started 36 years ago when Green dropped out of high school to apprentice for a London shoe importer run by an old family friend.

FORBES: Envy With Green

In fact, as it later emerged, he repaid it with a loan that Gilad and Omri arranged through an old family friend living in South Africa.

ECONOMIST: Hard questions for Ariel Sharon and his two sons

Thinley had gone the national dress code one better, donning ceremonial knee-high leather boots with upturned toes to welcome Connecticut-based photographer Kit Kittle, an old family friend, and me.

FORBES: Uncovering Bhutan, Land Of The Mountain Gods

They would be working the fields and his father would turn around and Albert had disappeared and they would find him "on a stump somewhere speaking to an imaginary crowd, " recalled Donald Lee Hackett, an old family friend.

CNN: Excerpt: 'The Prince of Tennessee: The Rise of Al Gore'

Each line might represent a friendship made while travelling, a family member abroad, or an old college friend pulled away by the various forces of life.

FORBES: The Art of Connectivity: Facebook's IPO-Defining Image

In another case, a friend of mine decided to donate an old family heirloom, one document showing the contribution of her ancestor in the military.

FORBES: Donating an Archive? Your Book Collection? Get an Appraisal