America's Richest Families

http://www.forbes.com/2009/12/03/americas-richest-families-walton-rockefeller-dupont-business-billionaires-families.html

12/03/2009
Duncan Greenberg and Marie Thibault

For Sam Walton, low prices meant vast riches. By 1985, Walton was America’s richest man. At the time of his death in 1992 he and his family were worth at least $23 billion, proceeds of a life spent selling everything he could fit under the roofs of his Wal-Mart stores–from tires to tortellini–at prices neighborhood stores could not match.

Today Walton’s heirs–two sons, a daughter, a daughter-in-law and two nieces–are worth at least $90 billion, making them the richest family in America.

The Waltons are so rich that they have more than double the dollars of the second richest family in the U.S., the Koch clan, who command a fortune of at least $40 billion.

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The four Koch brothers are the sons of Fred C. Koch, who invented a method of converting heavy oil into gasoline. Each son inherited a stake in Koch Industries when Fred died in 1967.

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Today Koch Industries is America’s second-largest private company by sales, with products ranging from fabrics to fertilizer. Charles and David each own 42% of Koch Industries and are vastly richer than their brothers.

William runs energy conglomerate Oxbow Corporation, which last year brought in $3.7 billion in sales. Frederick is said to be living in Europe.

Ranking third: the Mars family, represented by siblings John, Jacqueline and Forrest Jr. Their great-grandmother, Alva Mars, amused her Polio-stricken son Frank (d. 1934) with lessons in chocolate making during the 1880s.

In 1911, Frank launched what would become Mars Inc.–today the world’s largest confectionery company with $30 billion in sales–out of his kitchen in Tacoma, Wash. Frank’s son, Forrest, introduced M&Ms in 1941, and popularized malt-flavored nougat, the chewy-sweet staple that is the foundation of candy classics Milky Way, Snickers and 3 Musketeers.

The three siblings inherited the company when Forrest Sr. died in 1999.

In compiling the list of America’s Richest Families, Forbes scoured biographies, financial filings and our extensive database of well-heeled individuals past and present. The list represents an eclectic mix of families who play an active role in the companies their relatives built, living entrepreneurs who have showered their families with the spoils of their success and old-money families who live off of trusts created decades ago.

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