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Leadership research has assumed that leader group prototypicality enhances leadership influence during a leader’s tenure. Other leadership research has also assumed that leaders, especially founders, can transform their leadership influence into a legacy that will survive death and departure from the organization and continue to impact followers. However, to understand the historically embedded nature of leadership influence, it is critical to unpack how specific leaders can become group prototypes and influence followers after their departure. We address this opportunity by examining organizational ghosts—former organizational members who become the ideal prototype of an organization’s values and identity. Drawing on qualitative data from an organizational merger, our analysis reveals that admired and adored leaders with broad exposure became embodied organizational prototypes. After organizational …