Charles Wesley Robinson (September 7, 1919 – May 20, 2014) was an American entrepreneur who was involved with many successful business adventures in the mining and shipping industry.

Robinson was born in Long Beach, California, and spent his early years on a ranch overlooking the Antelope Valley in the Western Mojave Desert.

He then received an assignment to the heavy cruiser USS Tuscaloosa and spent nearly two years on the treacherous Murmansk run.

The young lieutenant found himself in charge of the main engine division on the ship during the D-Day landing of Normandy, during which the Tuscaloosa engaged in a long battle with a German battery (reported by the Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent Ira Wolfert in the August 1944 issue of Reader's Digest).

After further duty in the Pacific at Iwo Jima and Okinawa, in February 1946, Robinson had earned enough points to be discharged from the Navy and left for Palo Alto, California, to enter the Stanford University Business School.