William Bo S. Peabody, Class of 1994

Peabody is known as one of the most dynamic young entrepreneurs in the country. Even before graduating from Williams in 1994, Peabody, along with friend Brett Hershey ’95 and Professor Richard Sabot, formed the company Tripod, Inc. By building an online community of college students and young professionals, the company grew into the eighth most visited site on the World Wide Web before being sold in 1998 to Lycos for $58 million. Tripod was the first of a number of Internet-based start-up companies to emerge in or move to the northern Berkshires, which has since been dubbed by The Wall Street Journal as “Silicon Village.” Peabody’s devotion to the region has led to his involvement with the development of other businesses in northern Berkshire, including Streetmail. Last year he helped form Williamstown-based Village Ventures, a venture capital firm using investments and back-office support to replicate in similar communities across the country the model for breeding start-up success that has worked so well here.