Chapter VI

The Conservationist

The middle heir, Laurance Spelman Rockefeller. was born in New York City in 1910. Like his brothers, he attended an Ivy League college, Princeton. When the war broke out in 1941, he joined the Navy. As a lieutenant-commander in the production division, he superintended relations between the Navy and aviation contractors. As such, he developed a keen interest in military technology.

After the war, while his two elder brothers pursued careers in philanthropy and politics, Laurance became a high-technology entrepreneur. He provided the financing for Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, the First World War aviation ace, to buy the aviation division from General Motors and turn it into Eastern Airlines, which subsequently became profitable (after it was awarded the highly lucrative route to Puerto Rico by the government). On the basis of his war-time experience, he assumed that it would only be a matter of time before the government began replacing bombers with missiles, and he bought a New Jersey company, Reaction Motors, Inc., which had developed an early rocket engine along the lines of the captured German V-2 rocket. When the United States government chose Reaction Motors to make the engine for its newly-developed Viking missile, he made a small fortune. As missiles became more sophisticated, he invested heavily in Marquadt Aviation whose stock value increased 1000 per cent after it became publicly known that the government was buying its ram jet rocket engine for its next generation of missiles. Laurance was also instrumental in financing the McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, which became a prime supplier of aircraft for the Navy.

During the 1950s, Laurance continued to invest heavily in newly-formed companies specializing in military technology. The profits generated by the fluctuation of the stock prices of these companies proved a useful source of funds for the Rockefeller family, including his more politically ambitious elder brother, Nelson.

Laurance used his wealth to establish himself as a leading protector of the environment. He provided immense subsidies for America's national parks, including Yellowstone National Park, Marsh- Billings National Historical Park and the Grand Tetons, which helped cordon them off from commercial development. He funded the Conservation foundations, developed resort hotels in natural surrounding to build public support for conservation and served as an environmental advisor under presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford.


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