Founder Profile
John Crosby
Last reviewed: October 2026 · By Swet Parvadiya
Who is John Crosby?
John Crosby is a founder of General Mills, Inc., which was founded in 1866 with Cadwallader C. Washburn.
- Company founded
- General Mills, Inc.
- Founded
- 1866
- Co-founders
- Cadwallader C. Washburn
Background
John Crosby was Cadwallader Washburn's partner in the Washburn-Crosby Company, formed in 1877 to run the Washburn mills in Minneapolis.
Founding Story
John Crosby joined Cadwallader Washburn in 1877 to form the Washburn-Crosby Company. The firm's flour won a gold medal at the 1880 Millers' International Exhibition in Cincinnati, which became the Gold Medal Flour brand. Crosby died in 1887, long before the company created Betty Crocker (1921) and merged into General Mills (1928), so those later moves belong to successors such as James Ford Bell.
John Crosby was born in 1828 in Hampden.
John Crosby III was born on November 1, 1828 and died on December 29, 1887.