Billionaire philanthropist David Rockefeller, former head of Chase Manhattan bank and patriarch of one of the most famous and influential American families, died on Monday, a family spokesman said. He was 101. Rockefeller, who reportedly gave away nearly $2 billion in his lifetime, died in his sleep of congestive heart failure at his home in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., spokesman Fraser Seitel said in a statement.
No individual has contributed more to the commercial and civic life of New York City over a longer period of time than David Rockefeller.
Michael Bloomberg, a former mayor and fellow billionaire
One of the few remaining links to the Gilded Age era of robber barons, he was the son of John D. Rockefeller Jr., who developed New York's Rockefeller Center, and was the last living grandson of oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil and the family dynasty. He also embodied an era when globetrotting bank chiefs worked with the world's most powerful politicians. During his time as head of Chase, from 1969 to 1981, Rockefeller forged such a network of close relationships with governments and multinational corporations that observers said the bank had its own foreign policy. Rockefeller preached capitalism at home and favored assisting economies abroad on grounds that bringing prosperity to the Third World would create customers for American products. The billionaire businessman continued going to work every day into his 90s. His philanthropy and other activities earned him a Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, in 1998.
