Barbara Ann Corcoran

 Barbara Ann Corcoran, born March 10, 1949, is an American businesswoman and investor. She is also a speaker, consultant, speaker, columnist syndicated, author, and TV presenter. She founded The Corcoran Group, a real estate brokerage in New York City, which she sold to NRT for $66 million in 2001 and shortly thereafter exited the company. Corcoran was among the original Shark Tank investors. She was a regular on every episode of ABC's Shark Tank. By February 2020, she had signed 53 deals. The largest of these was a $350,000 investment for Coverplay at 40%. Corcoran, who was the second of 10 children from a working-class Irish-Catholic family was born in Edgewater in New Jersey.  Her mother, Florence, was a household worker. Her father, Edwin W. Corcoran Jr., bounced from job to job during Corcoran's childhood. Her family frequently depended on food delivery services for free from a local grocer. Corcoran still remembers her father as someone who would drink often and did not treat her mother with respect. Corcoran struggled in school, and was later told that she had dyslexia. Corcoran started high school at St. Cecilia High School Englewood after having attended an Catholic elementary school. After failing several classes during her first year, Corcoran transferred to Leonia High School in Leonia, where she graduated as a D student.