The
Rockefeller family, the Cleveland
family of John
D. Rockefeller (1839-1937) ("Senior") and
his brother William Rockefeller
(1841-1922), is an American
industrial, banking, and
political family of German American origin that made the world's
largest private fortune in the oil
business during the late 19th and early 20th century, primarily
through the Standard Oil
Company. The family is also known for its long
association with and financial interest in the
Chase Manhattan Bank, now
JP Morgan Chase.
Name and origin
The name is an anglicized version of the German
Rokkenfelder or
Rockenfeller, meaning
from
Rockenfeld.
The Rockefellers' origin can be directly
traced back to the villages of Ehlscheid
, Segendorf and Fahr (all suburbanised to Neuwied
, Rhineland-Palatinate
). These are neighbored to the small
settlement of Rockengffsafhjkkfeld - part of Neuwied's quarter
Feldkirchen. In Germany,
Rockenfeller is known as a family
name.
Family records in parish registers reach back to the end of the
Thirty Years' War. The earliest
known ancestors (direct line) are
Goddard Rockenfeller (*ca.
1590)
Johann Wilhelm
Rockenfeller (*ca. 1628,†1702) and
Johannes Rockenfeller (*ca.
1634,†1684). Johann Peter (*1682), son of Johannes, moved in 1723
to Ringoes, New Jersey.
Johann Thiel (*1695), grandson of Johann
Wilhelm, immigrated in 1735 to Germantown, New York
.
William Avery Rockefeller
was looking for a noble descent and a possible connection to a
French
Huguenot family de Roquefeuille was
discussed. However, this is unlikely because the name Rockenfeld is
recorded in the region long before the Huguenots fled France
(1685).
Johann Peter's grandson, William, married a distant relative,
Christina, the granddaughter of a cousin of Johann Peter. This
marriage produced a son, Godfrey, who married Lucy Avery in 1806.
Avery's ancestors were part of the Puritan tide from Devon, England
to Massachusetts around 1630. Lucy Avery could justly claim descent
from
Edmund Ironside, the English
king, crowned in 1016.
Godfrey and Lucy eventually shifted to the remote, backwater
stagecoach stop of
Richford, in the western
part of New York State. Their son,
William Avery Rockefeller
(1810–1906) was a trader in salt and timber who adopted a vagabond
life as a confidence man and was known as "Big Bill", who sired two
illegitimate children with his housekeeper. He married up, to Eliza
Davison in 1837; her father, John Davison, was relatively rich for
the time. Their second child was
John Davison Rockefeller, and their
third
William Rockefeller.
The
Rockefellers eventually settled near Cleveland, Ohio
, where they would develop into the world-renowned
family empire they are today. It was in Cleveland
where John
D. Sr. would
amass his great fortune through
Standard
Oil which he formed with his brother
William Rockefeller,
Henry Flagler, chemist
Samuel Andrews, and a silent partner
Stephen V. Harkness., and where he would later be
buried at Lake View
Cemetery
. In the generations since, however, the
Rockefeller family has largely migrated to New York City
, although many descendants remain in Cleveland or
have since spread out across the country (e.g. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia
). The family business headquarters is now
located in New York City's Rockefeller Plaza
.
The edifice complex
Often credited with an "edifice complex", members of the family
have been heavily involved in myriad real estate construction
projects in the US over the span of the twentieth century. Chief
among them:
- The International
House of New York - New York, 1924 (Junior) {Involvement: John
D. 3rd, Abby Aldrich, David & Peggy, David Jr., Abby
O'Neill};
- The
College of
William and Mary
's Wren Building - Virginia, from 1927
(Renovation funded by Junior);
- Colonial Williamsburg
- Virginia, from 1927 onwards (Junior, Abby
Aldrich, John D. 3rd), historical restoration;
- The
Museum of
Modern Art
- New York, from 1929 (Abby Aldrich, Junior,
Blanchette, Nelson, David, David Jr., Sharon Percy
Rockefeller);
- The
Riverside
Church
- New York, 1930 (Junior);
- The Cloisters
- New York, from 1934 (Junior);
- The Interchurch Center - New York, 1948 (Junior);
- The
Asia
Society
(Asia House) - New York, 1956 (John D.
3rd);
- One Chase Manhattan Plaza
- New York, 1961 (David);
- The Nelson A. Rockefeller Empire State
Plaza
- Albany, New York, 1962 (Nelson);
- Lincoln Center
- New York, 1962 (John D. 3rd);
- The
World Trade
Center
Twin Towers - New York, 1973 (David and
Nelson);
- The
Embarcadero
Complex - San Francisco, 1974 (David);
- The Council of the
Americas/Americas Society - New York, 1985
(David).
- In addition to this is Senior and Junior's involvement in seven
major housing developments:
- Forest Hill Estates in Cleveland, Ohio
- City Housing Corporation's efforts at Sunnyside
Gardens in Queens (NY)
- Thomas Garden Apartments in the Bronx (NY)
- Paul Lawrence Dunbar Housing in Harlem
- Lavoisier Apartments in Manhattan (NY)
- Van Tassel Apartments in Sleepy Hollow (formerly North
Tarrytown), New York
- A development in Radburn, New Jersey.
- A
further project involved David
Rockefeller in a major middle-income housing development when
he was elected in 1947 as chairman of Morningside
Heights
Inc. in Manhattan
by fourteen major institutions that were based in
the area, including Columbia
University. The result, in 1951, was the six-building
apartment complex known as Morningside Gardens.
- Senior's donations led to the formation of
the University
of Chicago
in 1889, where the first American Nobel Prize in
science was produced in 1907, and notable for the Chicago School of
Economics. This was one instance of a long family and
Rockefeller Foundation tradition of financially supporting Ivy League and other major colleges and
universities over the generations - seventy-five in total. This
includes:
- Senior (and Junior) also created
- Rockefeller University
in 1901
- General Education Board in 1902, which later (1923)
evolved into the International Education Board
- Rockefeller Sanitary Commission in 1910
- Bureau of Social Hygiene in 1913 (Junior)
- International Health Commission in 1913
- China Medical Board
in 1915.
- In the 1920s, the International Education Board granted
important fellowships to pathbreakers in modern mathematics, such
as Stefan Banach, Bartel Leendert van der
Waerden, and André Weil, which
was a formative part of the gradual shift of world mathematics to
the US over this period.
- To
help promote cooperation between physics and mathematics
Rockefeller funds also supported the erection of the new
Mathematical Institute at the University
of Göttingen
between 1926 and 1929
- The
rise of probability and mathematical statistics owes much to the
creation of the Institut Henri Poincaré
in Paris by American philanthropy also around this
time.
- Junior also financially supported numerous other major
institutions:
- Notable among them his ongoing support for the highly
influential foreign policy think tank
- The New York Council on
Foreign Relations, established in 1921.
- In 1978 the Rockefeller
Foundation initiated the founding of the financial advisory
council called the Group of Thirty,
as well as many grants to a myriad of universities, think tanks and
other institutions.
- Junior was also responsible for the creation
and endowment of the Colonial Williamsburg
Foundation
, which operates the restored historical town at
Williamsburg, Virginia
, one of the most extensive historic restorations
ever undertaken.
Conservation
Beginning with Rockefeller Senior, the family has been a major
force in land conservation.
Over the generations, it has created more
than 20 national parks and open spaces, including the Cloisters
, Acadia National Park
, Forest Hill Park, the Nature Conservancy, the
largest stand of old growth redwoods, the Rockefeller Forest in
California's Humboldt Redwoods State Park and the″Grand Teton
National Park
, amongst many others. Rockefeller Jr, and his son
Laurance (and his son
Larry)
were particularly prominent in this area. Most of these efforts
were accomplished without public fanfare.
The
family was honored for its conservation efforts in November, 2005,
by the National
Audubon Society
, one of America's largest and oldest conservation
organizations, at which over 30 family members attended. At
the event, the society's president, John Flicker, notably stated:
"Cumulatively, no other family in America has made the
contribution to conservation that the Rockefeller family has
made".
International politics/finance/economics
The family has been awarded the annual
UNA-USA’s
Global Leadership Award, along
with other recipients over time, including
Bill Clinton and
Michael Bloomberg. Members of the
Rockefeller family into the fourth generation (especially the
prominent banker and statesman
David
Rockefeller, who is the present family patriarch) have been
heavily involved in international politics, and have donated money,
established or been involved in the following major international
institutions:
- The Council on Foreign
Relations - David, David Jr., Nelson, John D. 3rd, John D. IV
(Jay), Peggy Dulany, Rockefeller Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers
Fund.
- The Trilateral Commission
- David, Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
- The Bilderberg Group - David,
John D. IV.
- The
Asia
Society
- John D. 3rd, John D. IV, Charles,
David.
- The Population Council - John
D. 3rd.
- The Council of the
Americas - David.
- The Group of Thirty - The
Rockefeller Foundation.
- The World Economic Forum -
David.
- The Brookings Institution
- Junior.
- The Peterson Institute
(Formerly the Institute for International Economics) -
David.
- The International Executive
Service Corps - David.
- The Institute for
Pacific Relations - Junior.
- The League of Nations -
Junior.
- The United Nations - Junior, John
D. 3rd, Nelson, David, Peggy Dulany, Rockefeller Brothers
Fund.
- The United Nations
Association - David.
The family archives
The
Rockefeller Archive Center, an independent foundation that
was until 2008 a division of Rockefeller University
, is a vast three-story underground bunker built
below the Martha Baird Rockefeller Hillcrest
mansion on the family estate at Pocantico (see Kykuit
).
Along forty-foot-long walls of shelves on rails, patrolled by ten
full-time archivists, is the entire repository of personal and
official papers and correspondence of the complete family and its
members, along with historical papers of its numerous foundations,
as well as other non-family philanthropic institutions. These
include: the
Commonwealth Fund,
Charles E. Culpeper Foundation,
Lucille
P. Markey Charitable Trust, and the
John and Mary
R. Markle Foundation.
In total, it holds over 70 million pages of documents and contains
the collections of forty-two scientific, cultural, educational and
philanthropic organizations.
Only the expurgated records of deceased family members are publicly
available to scholars and researchers; all records pertaining to
living members are closed to historians. As
Nelson Rockefeller's researcher, Cary
Reich, discovered however, in the case of Nelson's voluminous of
papers, about only one third of these files had been processed
(that is, each page vetted by the archivists) and released to
researchers up to 1996. He reports that it will be many years
before all the papers will be open to the public, despite Nelson
having died in 1979.
The Center maintains that this repository of records, covering
140-plus years of the records of the family, in addition to
non-Rockefeller philanthropic collections, gives unique insights
into United States and world issues and social developments in both
the 19th and 20th centuries.
Records in the collection are only available up until the early
1960s, generally 1961. Major subjects in the collection include:
- Agriculture,
- The Arts,
- African-American history,
- Education,
- International Relations,
- Economic Development,
- Labor,
- Medicine,
- Philanthropy,
- Politics,
- Population,
- Religion,
- Social Sciences,
- Social Welfare,
- Women's history.
Family wealth
The combined wealth of the family – its total assets and
investments plus the individual wealth of its members – has never
been known with any precision. The records of the family archives
relating to both the family and individual members' net worth is
closed to researchers. Independent researchers have valued the
assets of the Rockefeller family much higher, some approaching
amounts as high as $110 billion.
From the outset, and even today, the family wealth has been under
the complete control of the male members of the dynasty, through
the family office. Despite strong-willed wives who had influence
over their husbands' decisions – such as the pivotal female figure
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller,
wife of Junior – in all cases they received allowances only and
were never given even partial responsibility for the family
fortune.
Much of the wealth has been locked up in the notable family trust
of 1934 (which holds the bulk of the fortune and matures on the
death of the fourth generation), and the trust of 1952, both
administered by the
Chase Manhattan
Bank. These trusts have consisted of shares in the successor
companies to
Standard Oil and other
diversified investments, as well as the family's considerable real
estate holdings. They are administered by a powerful trust
committee that oversees the fortune. It has consisted over time of
high-profile individuals, which have included
Paul Volcker,
William G. Bowen
(former president of Princeton University
) and John
C. Whitehead (retired
co-chairman of
Goldman Sachs).
Management of this fortune today also rests
with professional money managers who oversee the principal holding
company, Rockefeller Financial Services, which controls
all the family's investments, now that Rockefeller
Center
is no longer owned by the family. The
present chairman is
David
Rockefeller, Jr.
In 1992, it had five main arms:
- Rockefeller & Co. (Money management: Universities
have invested some of their endowments in this company);
- Venrock
Associates (Venture Capital: an early investment in Apple
Computer
was one of
many it made in Silicon
Valley
entrepreneurial start-ups);
- Rockefeller Trust Company (Manages hundreds of family
trusts);
- Rockefeller Insurance Company (Manages liability
insurance for family members);
- Acadia Risk Management (Insurance Broker: Contracts
out policies for the family's vast art collections, real estate and
private planes.)
Family residences
Over the generations the family members have resided in some
notable historic homes. A total of 81 Rockefeller homes are on the
National Register of Historic Places. Not including all homes owned
by the five brothers, some of the more prominent of these
are:
- Kykuit
- The
landmark six-story home on the vast Westchester County family
estate, home to four generations of the family;
- Bassett Hall - The house at
Colonial Williamsburg bought by Junior in 1927 and renovated by
1936, it was favorite residence of both Junior and Abby and is now
a house museum at the family-restored Colonial Revival town;
- The Eyrie - A sprawling 100-room summer holiday home on Mount
Desert Island in Maine, subsequently demolished by family members
in the 1950s;
- Forest Hill
- The family's country estate and summer home in
Cleveland for four decades. Built and occupied by Senior, it
burned down in 1917;
- Golf
House
at Lakewood, New Jersey - The former three-story
clubhouse for the elite Ocean County Hunt and Country
Club, which Senior bought in 1902 to play golf on its golf
course;
- The Casements
- A three-story house at Ormond Beach in Florida,
where Senior spent his last winters, from 1919 until his
death;
- 10 West Fifty-fourth
Street - A nine-story single family home, the former residence
of Junior before he shifted to 740 Park Ave, and the largest
residence in New York City at the time, it was the home for the
five young brothers. It was later given by Junior to the Museum of
Modern Art;
- One Beekman Place - The
residence of Laurance in New York City;
- 740 Park Avenue
- Junior and Abby's famed 40-room triplex apartment
in the luxury apartment building, which was later sold for a record
price;
- The
JY
Ranch
- The landmark ranch in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the
holiday resort home built by Junior and later owned by Laurance, it
was used by all members of the family and had many prominent
visitors, including presidents, until Laurance donated it to the
federal government in 2001.
Legacy
A trademark of the dynasty over its 140-plus years has been the
remarkable unity it has maintained, despite major divisions that
developed in the late 1970s, and unlike other wealthy families such
as the
DuPont and the
Mellons. A primary reason has been the lifelong
efforts of "Junior" to not only cleanse the name from the
opprobrium stemming from the ruthless practices of
Standard Oil, but his tireless efforts to forge
family unity even as he allowed his five sons to operate
independently. This was partly achieved by regular brothers and
family meetings, but it was also because of the high value placed
on family unity by first Nelson and John 3rd, and later especially
with David.
As for achievements, in 1972, on the 100
th
anniversary of the founding of
Andrew
Carnegie's philanthropy, the
Carnegie Corporation, which has had a
long association with the family and its institutions, released a
public statement on the influence of the family on not just
philanthropy but encompassing a much wider field. Summing up a
publicly poorly grasped but predominant view amongst the
international philanthropic world, one sentence of this statement
read:
"The contributions of the Rockefeller family are
staggering in their extraordinary range and in the scope of their
contribution to humankind."
As far as wealth is concerned, John D. Rockefeller denied ever
being worth $1,000,000,000.
However, on September 29, 1916 (notably
years after the break-up of his Standard
Oil empire by the Supreme Court
in 1911), he officially passed that mark and became
the richest man who has ever lived, surpassing Carnegie's by
far.
He gave away US$540 million over his lifetime (in dollar terms of
that time), and became the greatest lay benefactor of medicine in
history. His son, "Junior" also gave away over $537 million over
his lifetime, bringing the total philanthropy of just two
generations of the family to over $1 billion from 1860 to 1960.
Added to this, the
New York
Times declared in a report in November, 2006 that
David Rockefeller's total charitable
benefactions amount to about $900 million over his lifetime.
The combined personal and social connections of the various family
members are vast, both in America and throughout the world,
including the most powerful politicians, royalty, public figures,
and chief businessmen. Notable figures through
Standard Oil alone have included
Henry Flagler and
Henry H. Rogers. Contemporary figures include
Henry Kissinger,
Nelson Mandela,
Richard Parsons (Chairman and
CEO of
Time Warner),
C. Fred
Bergsten,
Peter G. Peterson (Senior Chairman of the
Blackstone Group), and
Paul Volcker.
The
Rockefeller name is imprinted on numerous places throughout the
United States, most notably in New York City
, but also in Cleveland
, where the family originates:
- The
Rockefeller
Center
- A landmark 19-building 22 acre complex in the
center of Manhattan
established by Junior: Older section constructed
from 1930-1939; Newer section constructed during the
1960s-1970s;
- The
Rockefeller
University
- Renamed in 1965, this is the distinguished Nobel
prize-winning graduate/postgraduate medical school (formerly the
Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, established by
Senior in 1901);
- The Rockefeller
Foundation - Founded in 1913, this is the famous philanthropic
organization set up by Senior and Junior;
- The Rockefeller Brothers
Fund - Founded in 1940 by the third-generation's five sons and
one daughter of Junior;
- The Rockefeller Family Fund - Founded in 1967 by
members of the family's fourth-generation;
- The Rockefeller
Group - A private family-run real estate development company
based in New York that originally owned, constructed and managed
Rockefeller Center, it is now wholly owned by Mitsubishi Estate Co. Ltd;
- The
Rockefeller Research Laboratories Building - A major
research center into cancer that was established in 1986 and named
after Laurance, this is situated at the Memorial
Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
;
- The Rockefeller Center - Home of the International
Student Services office and department of philosophy, politics and
law at the State University
of New York at Binghamton;
- The
Rockefeller
Chapel
- Completed in 1928, this is the tallest building
on the campus of the University of Chicago
, established by Senior in 1889;
- The
Rockefeller Hall - Established by Senior in 1906, this
building houses the Case Western Reserve
University
Physics Department;
- The
Rockefeller Hall - Established by Senior and completed in
1906, this building houses the Cornell University
Physics Department;
- The
Rockefeller Hall - Established by Senior in 1887, who
granted Vassar
College
a $100,000 ($2.34 million in 2006 dollars)
allowance to build additional, much needed lecture space.
The final cost of the facility was $99,998.75. It now houses
multi-purpose classrooms and departmental offices for political
science, philosophy and math;
- The Rockefeller Hall - Established by Senior and
completed in 1886, this is the oldest building on the campus of
Spelman College;
- The Rockefeller College - Named after John D. Rockefeller III, this is a residential college at Princeton
University
;
- The Michael C. Rockefeller Arts Center -
Completed in 1969 in memory of Nelson Rockefeller's son, this is a
cultural center at the State University of New
York at Fredonia;
- The Michael C. Rockefeller Collection and the
Department of Primitive Art - Completed in 1982 after being
initiated by Nelson, this is a wing of the Metropolitan
Museum of Art
;
- The
David and Peggy Rockefeller Building - A tribute to
David's wife, Peggy Rockefeller, this is a new (completed in 2004)
six-story building housing the main collection and temporary
exhibition galleries of the family's Museum of
Modern Art
;
- The Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden -
Completed in 1949 by David, this is a major outdoor feature of the
Museum of Modern Art;
- The
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum - Opened in 1957
by Junior, this is a leading folk art museum within the complex of
Junior's Colonial
Williamsburg
;
- The Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Hall - The freshman
residence hall on the campus of Spelman
College;
- The Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Building -
Completed in 1918, it is among other things a student residence
hall at Spelman College, after the
wife of Senior and after whom the College was named;
- The Rockefeller State Park Preserve - Part of the
family estate in Westchester County, this preserve was officially
handed over to New York State in 1983, although it had previously
always been open to the public;
- The Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical
Park - Established as a historical museum of conservation by
Laurance during the 1990s.
- The
John D.
Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial
Parkway
- Established in 1972 through Congressional
authorization, connecting Yellowstone and Grand Teton National
Parks;
- The
Rockefeller Forest - Funded by Junior, this is located
within Humboldt Redwoods State Park
, California's largest redwood state
park;
- Either of two US congressional committees {in 1972 - John D. 3rd and 1975 - Nelson dubbed the Rockefeller Commission}.
- Rockefeller Park, a scenic park
featuring gardens dedicated to several world nations along Martin
Luther King, Jr. Blvd. between University Circle and Lake Erie
in Cleveland.
- The Winthrop Rockefeller Institute of the University
of Arkansas System was established in 2005 with a grant from the
Winthrop Rockefeller Charitable Trust. The educational
center with conference and lodging facilities is located on Petit
Jean Mountain near Morrilton, Arkansas, on the original grounds of
Gov. Winthrop Rockefeller’s model cattle farm.
- The David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at
Harvard University.
John D
Junior, through his son Nelson,
purchased and then donated the land upon which sits the UN
headquarters
, in New
York, in 1946. Earlier, in the 1920s, he had also donated a
substantial amount towards the restoration and rehabilitation of
major buildings in France
after
World War I, such as the Rheims
Cathedral
, the Fontainebleau
Palace and the Palace of Versailles
, for which he was later (1936) awarded France's
highest decoration, the Grand Croix of the Legion d'Honneur (subsequently also awarded
decades later to his son, David
Rockefeller).
He also
funded the notable excavations at Luxor
in Egypt,
as well as establishing a Classical Studies School in Athens
.
In
addition, he provided the funding for the construction of the
Palestine
Archaeological Museum
in East Jerusalem -
the Rockefeller
Museum
.
For all of the above reasons, the family and its far reaching
philanthropy, and its oil, real estate, banking, and international
institutions is still considered today to be America's greatest
family. It is also a benchmark for extreme wealth ("as rich as
Rockefeller"), as "Senior" is still regarded as the wealthiest man
who has ever lived, worth over $300 billion in today's figures,
easily surpassing
Bill Gates, in terms
adjusted by inflation indexing.
Generational philanthropy
The members of the Rockefeller family are noted for their
philanthropy; a
Rockefeller Archive
Center study in 2004 documents an incomplete list of 72 major
institutions that the family has created and/or endowed up to the
present day. Historically, the major focus of their benefactions
have been in the educational, health and conservation areas.
Family leaders in both philanthropy and business have included
John D. Sr.,
John D. Jr. ("Junior"),
John D. III,
Laurance Rockefeller and
David Rockefeller, who is the
family's current patriarch. Several family members have held high
public office, including
Vice President of the United
States (
Nelson Rockefeller),
United States Senator
(
Jay Rockefeller),
state governor (Nelson, Jay, and
Winthrop Rockefeller), and
lieutenant
governor (
Winthrop Paul
Rockefeller). Another noted family member was
Michael Rockefeller, son of Nelson
Rockefeller, an
anthropologist who
came to media attention after he was presumed killed in New Guinea
in 1961.
The corporate, financial and personal affairs of the family -
numbering around 150 blood relatives of John D. Rockefeller - are
run from the
family office,
Room
5600, known officially as "Rockefeller Family and Associates".
It
comprises three floors of the GE Building
in Rockefeller Center
; all private family legal matters are handled by
the family-associated New York law firm of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley &
McCloy. Room 5600 is also the base of the current family
historian,
Peter J. Johnson, who assisted with
David Rockefeller's
Memoirs, published in 2002.
To distinguish the generations and facilitate communication, the
fourth generation is generically known as "
The Cousins"
(24 in all, with 21 still living) and the younger family members
are known as the "
Fifth/Sixth" generation. Many if not all
of these family members are involved in institutionalised
philanthropic pursuits. Family links are solidified through the
practice of ritualised family meetings - which started with the
regular "brothers' meetings" held in Room 5600 or in their
respective private residences, beginning in 1945.
Family get-togethers
are held today at the "Playhouse", in the Westchester
County
family estate of Pocantico, in June (the
"cousins weekend") and December of each year (see Kykuit
).
Members of the Rockefeller family
Ancestors
- Goddard Rockenfeller (1590–1684) (m.1622) Magdalena
(1592–1656)
- Johannes Rockenfeller (1634–1684) (m.1678) Elizabeth Margaretha
Remagen (1634)
- Johann Peter Rockefeller (1681, Prussia–1763, Rocktown, NJ)
(Arrived in America 1708)
- Peter Rockefeller (1711–1787) (m.1740) Mary Bellis (1723–1772)
(Had nine children in all)
- Godfrey Rockefeller (1745–1818)
- Margaret Rockefeller (1750–1797) (m.late 1700s) George Trumbo
(1750–1830)
- William Rockefeller (1750–1793) (m.1700s) Christina Rockefeller
(1754–1800) (Distant relative) (Had seven children in all)
- Simon William Rockefeller (1775–1839)
- Godfrey Lewis Rockefeller (1783–1857) (m.1806) Lucy Avery
(1786–1867) (Had ten children in all)
- William W. Rockefeller (1788–1851) (m.early 1800s) Eleanor
Kisselbrack (1784–1859)
Descendants of John Davison Rockefeller
To the sixth-generation, with 21 still living in the fourth
(
the Cousins). The total number of blood relative
descendants as of 2006 is about 150.
- Elizabeth "Bessie"
Rockefeller Strong (1866–1906) (m.1889) Charles Augustus Strong
(1862–1940)
- Margaret
Strong (1897–1985) (m.1st.1927) George de Cuevas (1885–1961);
(m.2nd.1977) Raimundo de Larrain
- Alice Rockefeller
(1869–1870)
- Alta Rockefeller
Prentice (1871–1962) (m.1901) Ezra Parmelee Prentice
(1863–1955)
- John Rockefeller
Prentice (1902–1972) (m.1941) Abra Cantrill (1912–1972)
- Mary Adeline Prentice
Gilbert (1907–1981) (m.1937) Benjamin Davis Gilbert
(1907–1992)
- Spelman Prentice (1911) (m.3rd.1972) Mimi Walters
- Pamela Prentice (1938)(m.1st. 1960) Frans H. ten Bos
- Helena ten Bos (1962)(m. 1987) Count Frederic de Belloy de
Saint-Lienard
- Joanna ten Bos (1964)(m. 1989) Christopher Booth
- Peter Spelman Prentice (1940)
- Alexandra Sartell Prentice (1962)
- Peter Parmalee Bens (1987)
- Erik Carl Bens (1996)
- Sarah Prentice Bens (1997)
- Michael Andrew Prentice (1964)
- Alta Rockefeller Prentice (1942)
- Michael Sartell Prentice (1944)
- Edith Rockefeller
McCormick (1872–1932) (m.1895) Harold Fowler McCormick
- John Rockefeller McCormick (1897–1901)
- Editha McCormick (1903–1904)
- Harold Fowler McCormick, Jr. (1898–1973) (m.1931) Anne "Fifi"
Potter Stillman (1879–1969)
- Muriel McCormick (1902–1959) (m.1931) Elisha Dyer Hubbard
(1906–)
- Mathilde McCormick (1905–1947) (m.1923) Max Oser (1877–1942)
- John Davison
Rockefeller, Jr. (1874–1960) (m.1901) Abigail "Abby" Greene Aldrich
Descendants of William Rockefeller
An article in the
New York Times in 1937 stated that
William Rockefeller had, at that time, exactly 28
great-grandchildren.
- Lewis Edward Rockefeller (1865–1866)
- Emma Rockefeller McAlpin (1868–1934)
- William Goodsell
Rockefeller (1870–1922)
- William Avery
Rockefeller (1896–1973)
- Godfrey Stillman
Rockefeller (1899–1983)
- Godfrey Jr. Rockefeller
- Anderson Rockefeller
- Peter Rockefeller
- Benjamin Rockefeller
- James Stillman
Rockefeller (1902–2004)
- James Stillman Rockefeller, Jr. (born 1926)
- Liv Merlin Rockefeller Hessler (1957)
- Ola Stillman Rockefeller (1959)
- Nancy Sherlock Carnegie Rockefeller (1927)
- Andrew Carnegie Rockefeller (1929)
- Georgia Stillman Rockefeller (1933) (Married J Harden Rose)
- James Stillman Rose (1958)
- Andrew Carnegie Rose (1960)
- Georgia Rockefeller Rose (1961)
- John Sterling
Rockefeller (1904–1988)
- Almira Geraldine Rockefeller (1907) (The wife of MacRoy
Jackson, Samuel Weston Scott, and later Hardie Scott.)
- John Davison Rockefeller (1872–1877)
- Percy Avery Rockefeller
(1878–1934)
- Geraldine Rockefeller
Dodge (1882–1973)
Spouses
- Laura Celestia Spelman
"Cettie" (1839–1915) - John D. Rockefeller.
- Abby Greene Aldrich
(1874–1948) - John D. Rockefeller, Jr.
- Martha Baird Allen (1895–1971) - John D.
Rockefeller, Jr.
- Mary Todhunter Clark "Tod"
(1907–1999) - Nelson
Rockefeller.
- Margaretta Fitler Murphy
"Happy" (born 1926) - Nelson Rockefeller.
- Anne Marie Rasmussen - Steven C. Rockefeller.
- Blanchette Ferry
Hooker (1909–1992) - John D. Rockefeller 3rd.
- Sharon Percy - John D. "Jay" Rockefeller, IV.
- Mary French (1910–1997) - Laurance
Rockefeller.
- Wendy Gordon - Laurance "Larry" Rockefeller.
- Barbara "Bobo" Sears (1916– 2008) - Winthrop
Rockefeller.
- Jeannette Edris (1918–1997) - Winthrop
Rockefeller.
- Lisenne Dudderar - Winthrop Paul Rockefeller.
- Margaret "Peggy" McGrath (1915–1996) - David
Rockefeller.
- Diana Newell Rowan - David Rockefeller, Jr.
- Nancy King - Richard Gilder Rockefeller.
- Elizabeth "Bessie" Rockefeller
(1866–1906).
- Alta Rockefeller (1871–1962).
- Edith Rockefeller (1872–1932).
- Elsie Stillman Rockefeller (1872–1935).
- Isabel Stillman Rockefeller (1876–1935).
Select bibliography
- Abels, Jules. The Rockefeller Billions: The Story of the
World's Most Stupendous Fortune. New York: The Macmillan
Company, 1965.
- Aldrich, Nelson W. Jr. Old Money: The Mythology of
America's Upper Class. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988.
- Allen, Gary. The Rockefeller
File. Seal Beach, California: 1976 Press, 1976.
- Boorstin, Daniel J. The Americans: The Democratic
Experience. New York: Vintage Books, 1974.
- Brown, E. Richard. Rockefeller Medicine Men: Medicine and
Capitalism in America. Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1979.
- Caro, Robert A. The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall
of New York. New York: Vintage, 1975.
- Chernow, Ron. Titan: The Life of John D.
Rockefeller, Sr. London: Warner Books, 1998.
- Collier, Peter, and David Horowitz. The Rockefellers: An
American Dynasty. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston,
1976.
- Elmer, Isabel Lincoln. Cinderella Rockefeller: A Life of
Wealth Beyond All Knowing. New York: Freundlich Books,
1987.
- Ernst, Joseph W., editor. "Dear Father"/"Dear Son:"
Correspondence of John D. Rockefeller and John D.
Rockefeller, Jr. New York: Fordham University Press, with
the Rockefeller Archive Center, 1994.
- Flynn, John T. God's Gold: The Story of Rockefeller and His
Times. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1932.
- Fosdick, Raymond B. John D. Rockefeller, Jr.: A
Portrait. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1956.
- Fosdick, Raymond B. The Story of the Rockefeller
Foundation. New York: Transaction Publishers, Reprint,
1989.
- Gates, Frederick Taylor. Chapters in My Life. New
York: The Free Press, 1977.
- Gitelman, Howard M. Legacy of the Ludlow Massacre: A
Chapter in American Industrial Relations. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988.
- Gonzales, Donald J., Chronicled by. The Rockefellers at
Williamsburg: Backstage with the Founders, Restorers and
World-Renowned Guests. McLean, Virginia: EPM Publications,
Inc., 1991.
- Hanson, Elizabeth. The Rockefeller University Achievements:
A Century of Science for the Benefit of Humankind, 1901-2001.
New York: The Rockefeller University Press, 2000.
- Harr, John Ensor, and Peter J. Johnson. The Rockefeller
Century: Three Generations of America's Greatest Family. New
York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1988.
- Harr, John Ensor, and Peter J. Johnson. The Rockefeller
Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private. New
York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1991.
- Hawke, David Freeman. John D.: The Founding Father of the
Rockefellers. New York: Harper & Row, 1980.
- Hidy, Ralph W. and Muriel E. Hidy. Pioneering in Big
Business: History of Standard Oil Company (New Jersey),
1882-1911. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1955.
- Jonas, Gerald. The Circuit Riders: Rockefeller Money and
the Rise of Modern Science. New York: W.W.Norton and Co.,
1989.
- Josephson, Emanuel M. The Federal Reserve Conspiracy and
the Rockefellers: Their Gold Corner. New York: Chedney Press,
1968.
- Josephson, Matthew. The Robber Barons. London:
Harcourt, 1962.
- Kert, Bernice. Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the
Family. New York: Random House, 2003.
- Klein, Henry H. Dynastic America and Those Who Own It.
New York: Kessinger Publishing, [1921] Reprint, 2003.
- Kutz, Myer. Rockefeller Power: America's Chosen
Family. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1974.
- Lundberg, Ferdinand. America's Sixty Families. New
York: Vanguard Press, 1937.
- Lundberg, Ferdinand. The Rich and the Super-Rich: A Study
in the Power of Money Today. New York: Lyle Stuart, 1968.
- Lundberg, Ferdinand. The Rockefeller Syndrome.
Secaucus, New Jersey: Lyle Stuart, Inc., 1975.
- Manchester, William R. A Rockefeller Family Portrait: From
John D. to Nelson. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company,
1959.
- Moscow, Alvin. The Rockefeller Inheritance. Garden
City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1977.
- Nevins, Allan. John D.
Rockefeller: The Heroic Age of American Enterprise. 2
vols. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1940.
- Nevins, Allan. Study In Power: John D.
Rockefeller, Industrialist and Philanthropist. 2 vols. New
York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1953.
- Okrent, Daniel. Great Fortune: The Epic of Rockefeller
Center. New York: Viking Press, 2003.
- Reich, Cary. The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller:
Worlds to Conquer 1908-1958. New York: Doubleday, 1996.
- Roberts, Ann Rockefeller. The Rockefeller Family Home:
Kykuit. New York: Abbeville Publishing Group, 1998.
- Rockefeller, David. Memoirs. New York: Random House,
2002.
- Rockefeller, Henry Oscar, ed. Rockefeller Genealogy. 4
vols. 1910 - ca.1950.
- Rockefeller, John D. Random Reminiscences of Men and
Events. New York: Doubleday, 1908; London: W. Heinemann. 1909;
Sleepy Hollow Press and Rockefeller Archive Center, (Reprint)
1984.
- Roussel, Christine. The Art of Rockefeller Center. New
York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2006.
- Scheiffarth, Engelbert. Der New Yorker Gouverneur Nelson
A. Rockefeller und die Rockenfeller im Neuwieder Raum
Genealogisches Jahrbuch, Vol 9, 1969, p16-41.
- Sealander, Judith. Private Wealth and Public Life:
Foundation Philanthropy and the Reshaping of American Social
Policy, from the Progressive Era to the New Deal. Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
- Siegmund-Schultze, Reinhard. Rockefeller and the
Internationalization of Mathematics Between the Two World Wars:
Documents and Studies for the Social History of Mathematics in the
20th Century. Boston: Birkhauser Verlag, 2001.
- Stasz, Clarice. The Rockefeller Women: Dynasty of Piety,
Privacy, and Service. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995.
- Tarbell, Ida M. The History of the Standard Oil
Company. New York: Phillips & Company, 1904.
- Winks, Robin W. Laurance S. Rockefeller: Catalyst
for Conservation, Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1997.
- Yergin, Daniel. The Prize:
The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power. New York: Simon
& Schuster, 1991.
- Young, Edgar B. Lincoln Center: The Building of an
Institution. New York: New York University Press, 1980.
See also
Notes
- World's largest private fortune - see Ron Chernow, Titan:
The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr., London: Warner Books,
1998. (p.370)
- Scheiffarth, Engelbert: Der New Yorker Gouverneur Nelson A.
Rockefeller und die Rockenfeller im Neuwieder Raum.
Genealogisches Jahrbuch, 9 (1969), pp. 16-41
- Neuwied.de "Rockenfeld"
- Details of ancestors - see Chernow, Titan, op.cit.
(pp.3-10)
- Rockefeller.edu "Family, OMR"
- John D. Rockefeller, Jr. and the Van Tassel
Apartments, Rockefeller Archive Newsletter, Fall 1997
- The Morningside Heights housing project - see David
Rockefeller, Memoirs, New York: Random House, 2002.
(pp.385-87).
- UChicago.edu, "News, Nobel"
- Funded colleges and Ivy League universities - see Robert
Shaplen, Toward the Well-Being of Mankind: Fifty Years of the
Rockefeller Foundation, New York: Doubleday & Company,
Inc., 1964. (passim)
- Google Books: Rockefeller and the
Internationalization of Mathematics
- http://www.rockarch.org/about/; see also "New Governance at the
Rockefeller Archive Center," Rockefeller Archive Center Newsletter,
2008, p.3
- Rockefeller Archive Center (RAC) papers on Nelson not released
- see Cary Reich, The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to
Conquer 1908-1958, New York: Doubleday, 1996.(pp.774-5) (Note:
Reich died before completing the second volume of his life.)
- The
Rockefeller Archive Center
- Rockefeller.Edu "Family, JDR"
- Women in the family with no control over the family fortune –
see Bernice Kert, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller: The Woman in the
Family. New York: Random House, 1993. (p.100)
- Managing the family wealth, 1992 New York Times article
Rockefeller Family Tries to Keep A Vast Fortune From
Dissipating (see External Links). (Note: The names and nature
of these departments may have changed since 1992.)
- Amazon Books: Forest Hill
- Family unity maintained over the decades - see John Ensor Harr
and Peter J. Johnson, The Rockefeller Century: Three
Generations of America's Greatest Family, New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1988. (pp.370-71, passim); David's unifying
influence - see Memoirs (pp.346-7)
- Carnegie.Org "Rockefellers"
- See Standard Oil Co.
of New Jersey v. United States, 221 U.S. 1 (1911)
- Greatest benefactor of medicine in history - see Ron Chernow,
Titan: op.cit. (p.570)
- Rockefeller.Edu "JDR Jr"
- New York Times, November 21, 2006
- Cornell.Edu "Infobase" Retrieved
2007-01-30.
- Restorations and constructions in France, Egypt, Greece and
Jerusalem - see Memoirs, (pp.44-48).
- [1]
References
- Rose, Kenneth W., Select Rockefeller Philanthropies,
Booklet (pdf, 23 pages) of the Rockefeller Archive Center,
2004.
- Origin of Rockenfeld, in German
- Descendants of Goddard Rockenfeller
- Listing of University of Chicago Nobel Laureates, News Office,
University of Chicago website, undated.
- Depalma, Anthony, They Saved Land Like Rockefellers, The New
York Times Archive, November 15, 2005.
- Carnegie Corporation of New York, Celebrating 100 years of
Andrew Carnegie's Philanthropy - awarding the inaugural Andrew
Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy to David and Laurance
Rockefeller, 2001.
- The Rockefeller Archive Center, John D. Rockefeller, Junior,
1874-1960, Overview of his life and philanthropy, 1997.
- Strom, Stephanie, Manhattan: A Rockefeller Plans a Huge
Bequest, The New York Times Archive, November 21,
2006.
- O'Connell, Dennis, Top 10 Richest Men Of All Time,
AskMen.com, undated.