EXECUTIVES: New Faces at Exxon

It was something of a tradition at Exxon that the men who reached the top jobs there could trace their careers back to more or less rough-and-tumble beginnings in the oilfields. That was certainly true of big (6 ft. 2 in.), craggy, Canadian-born John Kenneth Jamieson, Exxon's chairman since 1969, who started out in the oil business in the 1930s as a laborer in a small refinery in Calgary, Alberta. Last week's announcement that Jamieson, now 64, will retire on Aug. 1 signals a subtle change in style at the colossus of the...