>>6466425

A year of massive fukery 1987.

Allow us to set the table:

http://archive.fortune.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1988/09/12/70997/index.htm

THE 1988 BILLIONAIRES, RANKED BY ASSETS

By

September 12, 1988

A#1 - (FORTUNE Magazine) – SULTAN HASSANAL BOLKIAH,42 Bandar Seri Begawan BRUNEI

$25.0

Oil; gas; $20 billion in foreign investments. With vast petroleum revenues flowing into his tiny, sparsely populated country on the island of Borneo, the Sultan is hard pressed to spend his money. But he tries. His 1,788-room palace includes air-conditioned stables for some of his 200 Argentine polo ponies. Though he often appears in a bemedaled uniform, his main claim to military fame was a $10 million donation to the Nicaraguan contras that wound up in the wrong Swiss bank account. Two wives, three sons, six daughters.

A#2 - KING FAHD BIN ABDUL AZIZ AL SAUD, 68 and family Riyadh SAUDI ARABIA

$18.0

The Saud family can draw at will on the Kingdom's oil reserves. A model of Islamic propriety since assuming the throne in 1982, Fahd once lost $500,000 while still a prince during one long night of gambling on the French Riviera.

A#3 - FORREST E. MARS, 84 Las Vegas NEVADA FORREST E. MARS JR., 57 McLean VIRGINIA JOHN F. MARS, 53 Arlington VIRGINIA JACQUELINE MARS VOGEL,48 Bedminster NEW JERSEY

$12.5

100% of Mars Inc. The secretive Mars clan became the richest family in the U.S. thanks to the rapid rise in value of premium food companies like Mars Inc., maker of M&Ms and other candy, Uncle Ben's Rice, and Kal Kan pet food. The elder Forrest Mars went to England in 1932 after quarreling with father Frank Mars, a Chicago candymaker (Milky Way, Snickers). Forrest built a bigger company than his dad's, then eventually bought him out. Forrest Jr. and John are now in charge. Mars's assets are often underestimated because the company is as loose with information as its McLean neighbor, the CIA.

A#4 - QUEEN ELIZABETH II, 62 London ENGLAND

$8.7

Real estate, including Balmoral Castle in Scotland (50,000 acres), Sandringham House in Norfolk (20,000 acres); major U.S. properties; racehorses; jewelry; art and stamp collections; vast shareholdings. Britain's popular Queen earns more than $30 million a year just from foreign investments – all tax-free. Three sons, one daughter.

A#5 - MITZI NEWHOUSE, 86 SAMUEL I. NEWHOUSE JR., 60 DONALD E. NEWHOUSE, 59 and family New York NEW YORK

$8.0

100% of Advance Publications and Newhouse Broadcasting. While still in his teens, Sam Newhouse Sr., penniless son of Eastern European immigrants, helped turn around a financially troubled New Jersey newspaper. In 1922 he took over another loser, the Staten Island Advance. Today his widow and sons still own the Advance, and 24 other daily newspapers, the ninth-largest cable TV operator in the U.S., Random House publishing company, the New Yorker, Parade, and Conde Nast's stable of magazines (Vogue, Glamour, Vanity Fair among others). Don handles newspapers and broadcasting. Si oversees Random House and the magazines.

>>6539204

A#6 - SAM MOORE WALTON, 70 and family Bentonville ARKANSAS

$7.4

39% of Wal-Mart Stores (annual sales: $16 billion). When discount stores sprang up around big cities in the 1950s, Walton figured the formula would work in small towns too. In 1962 he opened the first Wal-Mart in Rogers, Arkansas (pop. 5,700 at the time), and has mainly stuck to backwaters. He relinquished the chief executive's title earlier this year, but still likes to pop in at stores unannounced. Four children.

A#7 - ALBERT REICHMANN, 59 PAUL REICHMANN, 57 RALPH REICHMANN, 54 and family Toronto ONTARIO

$6.3

Olympia & York, largest owner of New York City commercial real estate (including $1.5 billion Battery Park City); with interests in Trizec real estate, Abitibi-Price, Gulf Canada, GW Utilities, Santa Fe Southern Pacific, Campeau Corp., and other companies. Canada's richest family controls more than 45 million square feet of office space in the U.S. and Canada. Fled Austria to Tangier to escape Nazis. Moved to Canada in 1956. Jumped into U.S. real estate market with a splash in 1977, paying $330 million for eight Manhattan office , buildings. Results were even splashier – the buildings' worth has since increased tenfold. Strict Orthodox Jews, the brothers value Talmudic studies more than a Harvard MBA. No private jets or polo ponies. Ten percent of their earnings goes to charity. Fourteen children among them.

A#8 - KENNETH COLIN IRVING, 89 and family Saint John NEW BRUNSWICK

$6.2

400 companies: oil, shipbuilding, forestry, pulp and paper, virtually every English-language newspaper in the province, employing nearly 30,000 workers. Built empire from his father's sawmill and a gas station. Three sons, nicknamed Gassy, Oily, and Greasy.

A#9 - KENNETH R. THOMSON, 65 and family Toronto ONTARIO

$6.0

73% of International Thomson Organisation; Thomson Newspapers; Hudson's Bay (more than 400 department stores, including Hudson's Bay, Simpsons, Field's); energy holdings; financial services; a distillery; real estate. The second Lord Thomson of Fleet started as a disc jockey on a family radio station in northern Ontario. Recently went on a buying spree, swallowing up small-town newspapers across North America. Owns more papers than anyone in the U.S. Three children.

A#10 - GERALD GROSVENOR, 36 and family London ENGLAND

$5.4

300 acres in London's upper-crust Belgravia and Mayfair districts; a 13,000- acre estate; 100,000 acres of Scottish forest land; Grosvenor International Holdings (real estate in Hawaii, San Francisco, Chicago, and British Columbia). The sixth Duke of Westminster is Britain's richest man. Wealth stems from 1677 when Sir Thomas Grosvenor's 12-year-old bride brought a cabbage patch as a dowry. London grew up around the cabbages. A patron of 150 charitable organizations. Lives with wife Natalia, godmother to Princess Di's son William, and two daughters, in Eaton Hall, a modern mansion 180 miles from London. Commutes in French-made Squirrel helicopter (sticker price: $900,000).