The Simmonses – $5.4B
The Simmonses are in possession of such a huge fortune thanks to corporate raiding. The wealth in the family is fairly new as it only started with Harold Simmons, Sr. He worked as a bank examiner and drug store employee before going on to form a capital company of his own. The company began to do corporate takeovers, and one publication even called him a “feared raider”. Whenever a corporation went under, he bought it out, stripped the company, gave it new life, and claimed the money he earned. This was something he did numerous times, mostly to smaller companies since they made for better targets than big conglomerates. He was a philanthropist as well. Did you know he paid out a donation of $200 million to the Southwest Medical Center at the University of Texas?
The Simmonses – $5.4B
The Newhouses – $18.5B
The Newhouse family is among the oldest and most influential clans in the publishing and media industries. Sam Newhouse was the founder of Advance Publications, the family business. When he died in 1979, he left the empire to his sons, Donald and Si. The brothers have since established themselves in the global media world and been called the leading moguls in the business. Advance Publications is now one of the largest magazine businesses in the world. They also own Conde Nast Publications, together with its heavy-hitter subsidiaries like The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, and Vogue. Overall, the company publishes print in 25 of the biggest cities in the country. If that has yet to impress you, the Newhouses also invested in the online platform Reddit and own a large stake in Discovery Communications.
The Newhouses – $18.5B
