The Rockefeller Clan: A Public Family

The nation's first billionaire believed that the power to make money was "a gift from God to be developed and used to the best of our ability for the good of mankind." Along with the bulk of his fortune, John D. Rockefeller passed that belief on to his only son, John D. Jr., who transmitted it to his own six children. After John D. Jr.'s death in 1960 at the age of 86, Lyndon Johnson said of him: "That old man up in heaven--or wherever he may be--must be awfully proud of all his boys. Every one of them's been a public servant."

The Brothers, as John D. Jr.'s boys are called, have earned L.B.J.'s accolade. From the family headquarters on the 56th floor of 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, they have reached out across the globe to give not only their money but also their time to a wide variety of public causes. "The word is stewardship" says John D. III. "What we inherited was ours on a service basis." The 56th floor is divided into four suites, one for each of the four surviving sons of John D. Jr. They are John D. Ill, 68, Nelson, 66, Laurance, 64, and David, 59.

There is no office for the fifth son, Winthrop, who died of cancer 19 months ago at age 60. He moved to Arkansas in the '50s, where he revitalized the state Republican Party and served two terms as Governor (1966-70). He gave millions to education and other causes in his adopted state and as Governor attempted to reform the state's notorious prison system. Nor is there an office in Rockefeller Plaza for John Jr.'s oldest child, Daughter Abby Mauze, 70, the widow of Banker Jean Mauze. Although she has been a major contributor to cancer research and donated a small park to New York City, she and her philanthropies have been overshadowed by those of her brothers. Explains John D. Ill: "It was five to one, and this was before women's lib."

In 1940 the six children of John D. Jr. established the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, to which their father willed half his estate. The fund is the one philanthropy that they operate jointly. In 1972 it made nearly 300 grants totaling more than $11 million. Now John D. Jr.'s grandchildren, the Cousins, as the family calls them, are carrying the tradition into the fourth generation. With their parents, they have created the Rockefeller Family Fund, described by a staffer as a "swinging" philanthropy that supports projects in five areas: conservation, equal opportunity for women, institutional "responsiveness," the arts and public aesthetics, and education.

Population problems have been the most abiding concern of John D. III. He helped support Birth Control Pioneer Margaret Sanger in the 1930s and in 1952 established the Population Council, which supports contraception research and family-planning programs around the globe. John D. III's concern over campus turmoil in the late '60s inspired his Task Force on Youth, set up to encourage and support projects in which the young can collaborate with the Establishment.

The Task Force is part of the JDR 3rd Fund, which for its first four years, beginning in 1963, was devoted to the support of Asian arts and cultural exchanges between the U.S. and Asia. John D. III recently gave his superb private collection of Asian art (valued at over $10 million) to the Asia Society, which he established in 1956. He was a prime mover in the development of Manhattan's Lincoln Center, to which he gave $11 million.

Laurance Rockefeller inherited two special interests from his father: conservation and medical research. Last week marked the 25th anniversary of his gift to the U.S. Government of 33,562 acres at Jackson Hole, Wyo. The land became Grand Teton National Park. Thanks to another gift from Laurance, there is also a 5,000-acre national park on the island of St. John in the U.S. Virgins.

Laurance has given time as well as money to philanthropy. In 1939 he was appointed to his first public post, as a member of the Palisades Interstate Park Commission, which operates a string of parks on the west side of the Hudson River. In 1963 he went to work for Brother Nelson, succeeding Robert Moses as chairman of the New York State Council of Parks and Outdoor Recreation, a post he has since resigned. He has pushed for bond issues that have helped the state acquire hundreds of thousands of acres of land for parks and recreation. In medical research, Laurance is a founder and chairman of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, parent of the renowned research institute.

When David Rockefeller was seven years old, he received an allowance of 50-c- a week. He was told to save 5-c- and contribute 5-c- to charity. "Our parents made us feel from an early age that we had to contribute, not just take," he recalls. As chairman of the Chase Manhattan Bank, the world's third largest (which he joined as assistant manager of the foreign department in 1946), David is one of the most powerful men in America. As the de facto head of the American Establishment, it has been said that for him the presidency would be a demotion.

David is a life trustee of the University of Chicago, where he earned a Ph.D. in economics, and chairman of the board of Rockefeller University (founded by his grandfather). He is chairman of an association that has helped plan the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan and a participant in similar projects in Washington, D.C., San Francisco and Atlanta.

At 37, John D. Rockefeller IV, the son of John D. III, is by far the best known and most political of the Cousins. "Jay" went to West Virginia in 1964 for an "American grass-roots experience" and has been there ever since. After two years as a poverty worker, he switched to politics because he figured it was the way "to get things done." From the state legislature he became secretary of state in 1968, then suffered a setback in 1972 when he lost his bid for Governor. "Jay" is now president of West Virginia Wesleyan College, a small, coeducational Methodist school, and thinking of running for Governor again in 1976. "I am driven to, attracted by, I love public life," says Jay. "Look at the alternatives. Business?"

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