How to live with a billion

This story is from the September 11, 1989 issue of Fortune. It is the full text of an article excerptedin Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2012, a Fortune Magazinebook, collected and expanded by Carol Loomis.

Master builder Sam and wife Ethel LeFrak beneath their Andy Warhol portrait

Are you sure you want a billion? Before you answer, consider H. Ross Perot. He has nearly three ofthem. He also has an original of the Magna Carta, some Remington and Charlie Russell bronzes, andGilbert Stuart's portrait of George Washington. But what he needs is a good pump repairman.

When Perot spoke recently to students at the Harvard business school, he warned them: "Guys, justremember, if you get real lucky, if you make a lot of money, if you go out and buy a lot of stuff -- it'sgonna break. You got your biggest, fanciest mansion in the world. It has air conditioning. It's got apool. Just think of all the pumps that are going to go out. Or go to a yacht basin any place in theworld. Nobody is smiling, and I'll tell you why: Something broke that morning. The generator's out;the microwave oven doesn't work; the captain's gay; the cook's quit. Things just don't meanhappiness."

What does? For many self-made billionaires happiness means work. Perot, with son Ross Jr., isbringing free enterprise to the airport business by helping to build one outside Fort Worth. Mostbillionaires still ply the trades that made them rich, and most discover that making all that money isa more durable source of happiness than spending it. Says Warren Buffett, who still puts in ten-hourdays despite his $3.6 billion: "I'm doing what I would most like to be doing in the world, and I havebeen since I was 20." What keeps him going, he says, is the admiration he holds for his businesscolleagues. "I choose to work with every single person I work with. That ends up being the mostimportant factor. I don't interact with people I don't like or admire. That's the key. It's likemarrying."

Buffett calls Berkshire Hathaway his canvas.

William Gates III could have retired before he turned 30. When the first PC was just a gleam inIBM's

IBM

blue eye, Bill Gates, at age 13, had taught himself computer programming. By 19, he had foundedMicrosoft

MSFT

, the company that turned "software" into a household word. Money didn't drive Gates then and itdoesn't now. "Bill's original vision," says Microsoft senior vice president Steve Ballmer, "was thatyou should be able to put a personal computer on every desk and in every home. If somebody backthen had bothered to run the numbers on that proposition, it obviously would have looked like a verybig business. But we never ran the numbers." For 1988 the numbers showed Microsoft's netrevenues at close to $600 million. Gates still stays at the office some days until midnight.

High tech and investing have an aura of excitement and sex appeal. But billionaires hoeing far lessglamorous rows keep right on hoeing: Rudolf Oetker makes baking powder. Max Schachenmannoriginally got rich by producing the "finest putty available." Samuel LeFrak, building a city on NewJersey's shore, has specialized in middle-class housing described as solid -- "with kitchens andplumbing you could take to the bank."

Grete Schickedanz, owner of Europe's largest mail-order catalogue business, still occasionally picksthe fashions hausfraus will be wearing next season. Ronald Perelman has had to digest a Whitman'ssampler of commonplace businesses to get his billion: perfumes, razor blades, licorice, and cigars.And Korean-born Kenkichi Nakajima, after coming to Japan as a student and being put to work in adefense factory during World War II, decided in 1949 that he wanted to manufacture a productcompletely unrelated to war. He chose pachinko machines, Japan's version of pinball, naming hiscompany Heiwa, or "peace." By beating words into pinball he has become the world's biggestmanufacturer of such machines, scoring $360 million in sales last year. Heiwa stock began tradingpublicly in Japan a year ago; it rose nearly 70% in value the first day it was offered and is now upanother 30%.

David Packard

The problem with working, however, is that it leads, inevitably, to the accumulation of more things --more leaky yachts, more busted pumps. But there is a way out, elegant in its simplicity: Give moneyaway. If fortune becomes oppressive, show it the door.

Ross Perot, in philanthropy as in his business ventures, insists on strict accountability: "I am deadinterested in seeing that they deliver the goods. That is one of the reasons we give a great deal ofmoney to the Salvation Army, because they feed the poor, they don't write books about it."Waldemar Nielsen, an expert on foundations and author of The Golden Donors, expects big thingsfrom Perot's foundation: "He seems to have strong impulses and a lot of daring. Of the present cropof billionaires, he's one of the few with the potential to become a Carnegie." The beneficiaries ofPerot's largess have been the Dallas Symphony, the Texas public schools, and a major Dallas medicalcenter.

Giving one's entire fortune away -- without wincing -- is the ultimate way of saying, "I didn't do it forthe money." Earlier this year David Packard announced that he would be giving nearly all hisHewlett-Packard

HPQ

stock, worth more than $2 billion, to his foundation, which champions causes he and his late wifebelieved in, such as reducing infant mortality.

The size of his gift seems all the more extraordinary when one considers that the very rich, as agroup, are not especially generous: Total giving seldom rises above a few percent of their net worth,at least before their death. Though the number of foundations has grown 20% since 1981, thenumber created by persons of great wealth has been in decline since 1969, when legal changesreduced the tax benefits.

Philanthropist H. Ross Perot, flanked by pictures of wife Margot and son Ross Jr., holds his charitiesstrictly accountable.

Packard will help select the organizations that will benefit from his money. But other donors chooseto leave that to hired hands. Says Nielsen: "A lot of them don't know what the hell they want to dowith their money. If a man has any real charitable or intellectual causes, of course, he would give tothose specific things. But a high proportion of people who succeed financially have no interest incharity, no causes, no clear-cut interests. There are wonderful exceptions, but on the whole theirlives are their businesses."

When philanthropy marries eccentricity, whimsical gifts result. Robert Lacey, a biographer of theFord family, believes Henry I created historic Greenfield Village so he could have a place to square-dance. In old age, the carmaker became preternaturally fond of Turkey in the Straw, and retained astaff of fiddlers so he could hear it on demand. He began collecting things from his childhood --steam irons, plows, threshers, and stoves. He captured his friend Thomas Edison's dying breath in abottle. Though collecting industrial artifacts is accepted practice today, in the 1930s it seemed kindof loopy. Ford's hoard of keepsakes became the Henry Ford Museum. (Josephine Ford today upholdsher family's reputation for whimsy by occasionally hiding live lobsters in her children's beds.)

While no current billionaire rivals Ford for eccentricity, some have definite notions about giving.Master builder LeFrak has given to so many educational institutions that he has troubleremembering them all: the gymnasium at Amherst, a library at Oxford, and an endowed chair at theUniversity of Maryland.

Newcomer Ronald Perelman has been attending board meetings since he was 11. He now ownsRevlon, jewel of an eclectic empire.

"But actually," says LeFrak, warming to his subject, "what I am is an explorer." His money is helpingfinance a search in Tanzania for the missing link. If LeFrak has his way, it won't be missing muchlonger. A few years ago LeFrak helped Robert Ballard locate the Titanic. The challenge of finding anolder vessel now confronts him -- Noah's ark: "I just received from Texas, from Jim Irwin you know,the astronaut -- a letter saying that he got permission from the Turkish government, and they wantto go up in a helicopter to find Noah's ark. They feel it's sitting on top of a mountain."

Ed Bass, the environmentalist among the Texas Bass brothers, is building an ark right now on theedge of Arizona's Sonora Desert. Called Biosphere II, it's a 2 1/2-acre microcosm of the earth underglass that includes a downsize ocean, rain forest, desert, and savanna. After the necessary flora andfauna have been installed (including mosquitoes and eight people), the ecosystem will be sealed shutfor two years, starting in 1990, to see whether it can sustain itself. By then Bass will have sunk some$30 million into the project. What does he hope to gain? Knowledge and profit. No one before hasengineered so large an ecosystem, and if this one works, Bass's group thinks future biospheres couldbe sold as habitats for Mars or stressed-out Manhattanites. Maybe Noah should have chargedadmission.

For $30 million, Ed Bass is building Biosphere II, a miniature earth under glass.

No eccentric, Warren Buffett has limited his innovations to finance. At Berkshire Hathaway

brk.a

, he has pioneered a novel approach to corporate giving. Every shareholder gets to direct a sum (lastyear it was $5 per share owned) to any charity.

When it comes to personal giving, Buffett feels that picking causes is harder than picking stocks. "Instocks, you're looking for things that are obvious and easy to do. You try to identify the one-foot barsyou can step over. But when you get into the charitable arena, you are attacking problems that havebeen the most intractable and resistant to solution throughout history. The most important ones areall seven-foot bars." Population control and diffusing the nuclear threat, the two causes Buffett'sfoundation supports, are "bars so high up that I can't even see 'em. Real lulus."

Though Buffett has spent only $10 million to $15 million on these causes so far, he intends to givemuch more. Waldemar Nielsen thinks Buffett hasn't even warmed up yet: "He's one of those veryrare guys who is not only one hell of an entrepreneur in business, but one hell of an entrepreneur inthe philanthropic field. We haven't had one in a long time."

The Buffett Foundation will get almost all Buffett's stock when he dies. And he doesn't think givingits trustees a narrow charter would be wise: "That's like telling them what to invest in ten years afterI die. I would rather have a smart, well-intentioned, high-grade person looking at the problems of theday through eyes that are open, not through my eyes that are in a coffin. I found in runningbusinesses that the best results come from letting high-grade people work unencumbered. Stickaround. If you're young enough, you'll see how it all works out."

-By Alan Farnham

In the public eye

"We are of the same breed. One of her ancestors was Attila the Hun and one of mine was GenghisKhan. We have found each other. We are on the same wavelength." So says Prince Johannes vonThurn und Taxis of West Germany about motorcycle-riding, electric-guitarplaying 29-year-oldPrincess Gloria, his wife. He's rich -- an inherited fortune of $2.5 billion, mostly in banking andlandholdings -- and the flamboyant "Johnny TNT," 63, doesn't hide it. For what good is a billiondollars stashed in a Swiss bank account if nobody knows it's there? It won't get much attention, andneither will its owner.

Microsoft mogul William Gates Ill is $300 million poorer this year but retains his zest for hard work.

The TNTs are stars among a subset of billionaires who think flaunting it is half the fun. BejeweledGloria, in her ever-changing hairdos and feathered, often grotesque hats, is a favorite of thepaparazzi. This year she appeared on a TV game show, and in March the couple sailed to theGalapagos Islands on their 120-foot yacht. Later it was on to Havana to meet Johannes's friend andformer university classmate Fidel Castro. Gloria's costume ball for 200 at a Paris nightclub lastFebruary was attended by the likes of Boy George and Jack Nicholson.

All that attention, however, has its pitfalls, and the prince and princess of kitsch had their share thisyear. Unflattering tales appeared in The Andy Warhol Diaries, published in May. In July an elderlywoman demanded a payment of three million German marks; in return she promised the name of aperson she said was slowly poisoning the prince. She was nabbed by police when she showed up tocollect. And the TNTs do have their differences. Says Johannes: "We are fighting all the time. But wehave the children, and that is all that matters." The children are daughters Maria Theresia andElisabeth, and, to the prince's relief, fiveyear-old son Albert, the heir to his fortune.

Hungarian Baron Hans Henrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, who lives in Switzerland, attracts attentionmostly for his extraordinary art collection, which rivals the Queen of England's, but his five wiveshave been noticed too. No. 2 was an English model. Life and art meet in his current marriage, toCarmen "Tita" Cervera, in her late 40s, a former Miss Barcelona and Miss Spain who undressedseveral years ago in the German Penthouse. Tita persuaded Heini, as he's known to friends, to loan787 of his 1,400 paintings to her native country.

Baron Thyssen-Bornemisza with his fifth wife, the former Miss Spain. She landed part of his artcollection for her country.

When the 68-year-old Heini announced plans to ensure the safekeeping of his collection beyond hisown lifetime, he was courted by emissaries from Great Britain, West Germany, Japan, and France.The Prince of Wales made a personal visit. But the word is that Tita is hoping to be named aduchess.

For the moment the collection is still housed in the baron's main residence, Villa Favorita, on LakeLugano in southern Switzerland. His white Rolls-Royce, equipped with three telephones, can befound parked at the end of a cypress-lined drive. Most of the villa is open to the public, a policy Heini

adopted in 1947 after the death of his father, who preferred a little more privacy. Considered aprime target for an abduction, Thyssen is constantly surrounded by a rotating crew of bodyguards --rotation makes them less recognizable. Still, he consults a fortuneteller every morning.

One way to make sure the world knows you're around is to put your name on everything. That's whatDonald Trump did with the 21 planes of the Eastern Shuttle, which flies the Boston-New York-Washington trade and which he bought for $365 million. He claims it's good business: "My namecreates big play. Let's take the Trump Shuttle. When I bought that thing, it had only 7% of themarket share. The week after it had 50%" -- a number Fortune has been unable to verify.

Trump says he's troubled by the public perception that he has a big ego. "Sure, some of the things Ido are for ego. But that has lessened so much since I first started. Now I enjoy the creative end of itand get a big kick from giving my money away. I give to AIDS research and our Vietnam vets."Trump says the earnings from his second book, which he's still in the process of writing, a sequel toThe Art of the Deal, will also be donated to charity.

TV tycoon Berlusconi with a portrait of himself in his days as a youthful crooner.

Most billionaires don't announce what they're worth. Trump does. He insists it's at least $5 billion,several billion more than Fortune is willing to credit him with after adjusting for his debt.

European television tycoon Silvio Berlusconi is another who doesn't play down his net worth.Fortune estimates that Berlusconi's is about $2.8 billion; his own estimates run as high as twice thatfigure. He's rich in terms of power as well, he points out. He has no shareholders to answer to andno other family members with large holdings in his company, Fininvest. He says he is "much richer"than Giovanni Agnelli, chairman of Fiat, Italy's largest private industrial group who has $1.7 billion.Still, Berlusconi treats his fellow Italian with considerable deference: "I never forget that he's theemperor and I am only a fellow who made a lot of money. I almost think he likes me."

Berlusconi, of course, made his money in the show-and-tell world of TV. In high school he performedin a band with friends and played the big summer dance spots. When friends come to his home, heoften plays the piano and croons from his 1,000-song repertoire. But Berlusconi is also a workaholic.He's not sure whether he has nine or ten homes, since he has precious little time to enjoy them.

New York University's medical center was renamed Tisch Hospital after Larry (above) and brotherBob gave $30 mlillon.

Some get attention simply because of the power they wield. Agnelli has been chairman of Fiat for 22years. In Italy alone, the company accounts for 12% of exports. Agnelli's sister Susanna sits inParliament and is under secretary at the Foreign Ministry. Brother Umberto, vice chairman of Fiat,has been in Parliament.

While Agnelli is establishment, Sir James Goldsmith gains his notoriety by attacking it. Among hisother corporate takeover efforts, Goldsmith recently made a bid for BAT Industries.

Not all public attention is sought out, or even welcome. Take billionaire Tsai Wan-lin, 65% owner ofCathay Life Insurance in Taipei, a newcomer and No. 6 on our list. He hates publicity, but with a networth of $9 billion, he's in the newspapers often. Money has been flowing into Taiwan for the pastfew years because of export earnings, but investment vehicles are few. So the stock market hasbecome a national craze. Meanwhile, in an increasing acceptance of Western ways, large numbers ofTaiwanese are buying life insurance for the first time. The industry is growing at an annual rate of25%. Cathay's dominant position in its market makes it one of the most popular issues on theinflated Taipei Stock Exchange. Its stock has more than doubled in price in the past 18 months.

Murdoch's secret: He's jogging now.

Despite the value of his holdings, Tsai still lives in a modest apartment building a block fromcompany headquarters, refuses interview requests, and, according to Cathay managing director LiuChia-lin, rejected the suggestion that he trade in his 1987 Mercedes for a Rolls-Royce because "hedoesn't want to show off." Tsai's idea of high living is escaping to a suburban hillside villa on

weekends and playing an occasional round of golf. He usually tees off alone, though, since he walksthe course too fast for most partners.

The Benetton family, though they keep their private lives fairly private, also can't help being visible.And as with Trump, name recognition means business. Luciano, Giuliana, Gilberto, and Carlo aim tomake the Benetton label a household word from Indiana to Indonesia. Says the company president,Luciano, whose granny glasses and frizz of gray hair recall the Sixties: "The European Community isfor us a domestic market. We're paying ever closer attention to the international market that alreadyaccounts for 37% of our billings."

Benetton's brightly colored clothing and accessories are sold in franchise stores in 79 countries. Thecompany is negotiating a joint venture with the Soviet Union for production and distribution. With a1989 advertising budget of $70 million, four times the 1984 figure, the Benettons have begunspending to get their message out.

Secretive banker Edmond Safra

If you are rich and get in trouble with the law, watch out. You could turn into the "Great WhiteDefendant," to use novelist Tom Wolfe's phrase. It happened to Michael Milken, charged withracketeering, and to Harry Helmsley and his oft-pictured wife. Leona is on trial for tax fraud andextortion (Harry was excused from the proceedings because of illness), accused of charging to theirbusiness $4 million in purchases for their Connecticut mansion, including Louis XVI marble-toppeddressers, a $57,000 stereo system, and a swimming enclosure. Former employees have taken thestand against the Helmsleys, portraying Leona as a penny-pinching, manipulative, unpopular boss. Aformer housekeeper testified that Leona once told her, "We don't pay taxes; the little people paytaxes." New York City Mayor Ed Koch called Leona "the wicked witch of the West."

One way to avoid all the hassle is to take it on the lam. Commodity trader Marc Rich did, and hasavoided trial on charges that he defrauded the U.S. of $48 million in taxes on oil trades. He's now acitizen of Spain and a resident of protective Switzerland. He has hired a staff of public relationsstrategists to promote a public image of Rich the philanthropist. Recipients of his generosity: the ArtMuseum of Zurich, the local Zug hockey team, mountain farmers, and a school for clowns. Richhimself is never far from the social whirl. "It's open house all winter long," says a frequent guest athis Swiss chalet. He's also spending more and more time at his lavish estate in Marbella, Spain,hobnobbing with pals Enrique Muijca, Spain's Minister of Justice, and Manuel Chaves, Minister ofLabor.

The best way to stay out of the papers is to stay out of trouble. The Marriott name is everywhere --

on some 500 hotels and 1,100 restaurants -- but as devout Mormons, family members lead lives ofsuch boring rectitude that they are almost never mentioned except in financial journals like Fortune,which put J. Willard on its cover this year for his outstanding performance as a business leader. -ByJulianne Slovak

Behind the moat

In sharp contrast to Donald Trump and Silvio Berlusconi are billionaires you probably have neverheard of, men who work hard -- and successfully -- at being invisible.

Morocco's King Hassan II -- with son Prince Sidi -- has been lucky as well as rich. He has survivedthree assassination attempts.

Take Donald W. Reynolds, who started almost three-quarters of a century ago selling newspapers onthe streets of Oklahoma City. Today his Donrey Media Group in Fort Smith, Arkansas, owns 57dailies in 20 states. Yet he is virtually unknown outside his company, and even within Donrey only afew key employees see much of him. He lives in a fortress-like home near Las Vegas, jetting into FortSmith in his private Boeing 727.

Why do some billionaires try to hide? Shyness is one reason. Class is another. "It's more tasteful,"says one. A third motive is to avoid hassles. As Michael Phillips wrote in his book, The Seven Laws ofMoney, wealth can bring lots of headaches. Envy. Endless pleas for donations. Kidnapping.Terrorism. Finally, a few just might have something to hide.

Secrecy does not come cheap. For those willing to pay, a coterie of professional minions-cu--martial-artsexperts stand ready to scramble phones (at least $600), debug offices ($1,500 and up),and scope out restaurants ahead of time as well as thwart the advance of fans by stepping on theirfeet ($55 an hour).

The ultimate, of course, is a private island. The Bahamas, with 700 shards of palm-treed sand, offersa wide selection, from $300,000 (ten acres) to $4 million (500 acres). But the solitude isn't complete.Says Rodney Dillard of Sotheby's International Realty: "A lot of people think if they buy an island,they will get sovereignty. But it can't be done."

Sullen in Brunei

Sovereignty doesn't buy much in the way of safety anyway. With the aid of a battalion of Gurkhas,the Sultan of Brunei, the richest man in the world, has managed to keep his tiny, oil-rich countryquiet since a brief rebellion in 1962. King Hassan II of Morocco, who is said to have baraka, orsoldier's luck, has survived three assassination attempts. In an abortive coup in 1972, MoroccanRoyal Air Force fighters riddled his 727 as he returned from France. The quick-witted Hassangrabbed the plane's microphone and, pretending to be a crew member, radioed that the king hadbeen "mortally wounded." The attackers thoughtfully stopped firing to avoid harming otherpassengers. The plane landed on one engine, and Hassan escaped into the nearby woods.

Islands and kingdoms aside, Switzerland is the haven of choice. It has more known billionaires percapita than any major country -- approximately one in 360,000 -- and about half were bornelsewhere. Though the country no longer holds a monopoly on secrecy -- Austrian and Hungarianbanks, for instance, offer greater confidentiality -- it still boasts the best overall package.

Residents of Switzerland are not allowed to disclose ownership in companies, and for the very richincome taxes are negotiable. If that's not enough, the Swiss Bankers' Association publishes a 100-page guide to "asset management" that includes a list of 22 tax havens around the world, includinglittle-known Nauru in the South Pacific. The pamphlet describes intricate maneuvers that in manycountries would look a lot like tax evasion.

As untouchable as cactus: Few of the editors who work for Donald Reynolds's chain of 57newspapers ever lay eyes on him.

One industrialist who takes advantage of all Switzerland has to offer is Otto Beisheim, owner ofMetro International, a retail and wholesale giant with $25 billion in annual sales. This West German

entrepreneur, who introduced the concept of "cash and carry" to Europe -- a process in which aretailer pays cash to the wholesaler and takes the merchandise with him -- is not known by sight orby name in the Swiss town of Baar, where he lives.

His unpretentiousness is nothing new. Old-timers at Metro recall that the day before Beisheimopened his first cash-and-carry market in 1967, he was painting lines in the parking lot. His wife wasinside erecting a jewelry booth.

For a native Swiss, circumspection comes as naturally as yodeling. The Andre family, owners ofAndre Cie, a $6.8-billion-a-year international trading company in Prilly, live so quietly and conducttheir affairs so discreetly that even their closest advisers don't know how much they are worth. Theirholdings include Garnac Grain, a Kansas-based company that controls nearly 10% of the world'sgrain market, plus shipping companies, cattle ranches, and coffee-processing plants.

For generations, the Andres have been part of the Plymouth Brethren, a religious group that seeksto restore the simple, austere life of the early Christians. Not for them lavish chalets, priceless artcollections, or soirees with the Bianca Jagger crowd. The Andre clan -- Henri, Eric, and Pierre --leadmodest, middle-class lives near Lausanne.

Equally inconspicuous is their countryman Mark Diethelm, a quiet, serious fellow resembling anoverweight bank clerk, who owns Diethelm Co., a $1.5-billion-a-year diversified trading company.With the exception of an interview last year in the Swiss financial magazine Bilanz, Diethelm hassteered clear of the press. Don't look for his picture: a worldwide photo search came up empty.

Playing confidential banker to this club is an equally secretive Lebaneseborn financier who glidesquietly about in a limousine bearing the license plate EJS 555. EJS stands for Edmond J. Safra: Thenumber five, many Middle Easterners believe, brings good luck.

It seems to have worked for Safra. Since his early days in Lebanon, where he helped his fatherfinance camel caravans, Safra has built a worldwide network of banks from Tokyo to Buenos Aires toNew York, where he controls Republic National Bank. Along the way he acquired a celebratedclientele of wealthy Latin Americans and Arabs by providing personal investment advice through theprivate banking arm of his empire, the Trade Development Bank.

Safra sold his bank to American Express

AXP

in 1983 for $550 million, and went along as chairman. He departed 18 months later for reasons thatwere never fully explained. In 1988, on the expiration day of his agreement not to compete withAmerican Express for five years, he opened a new private bank in Geneva. Safra Republic Holdingsis on the same street as American Express.

Perhaps afraid that Safra would take back some of his old customers, a few American Expressrepresentatives earlier this year apparently did some whispering that tied Safra to drugmoneylaundering. Safra threatened to sue. In August, American Express revealed that as a settlement ithad paid $4 million to some of Safra's favorite charities. A few days later the company said that ithad actually settled for $8 million. Why the discrepancy? As with so many matters involving Safraand his money, questions remain.

Until recently one country appeared even more secretive than Switzerland: the Soviet Union. In the

absence of a Russian billionaire, we offer an American who operates like one -- Whitney MacMillan,powerful chairman of Minnesota-based Cargill, the largest private corporation in the country. If hisname doesn't ring any bells, don't feel dull. Despite running a company that handles about 25% ofworld grain trade and employs more than 50,000 people, MacMillan remains eerily anonymous --even in agriculture and commodity-trading circles.

Cargill's worldwide intelligence network controls the flow of information in and out of the companywith the sophistication of the KGB. Marvels Ralph Nader, who conducted countless interviews withfriends and relatives of MacMillan for his book The friends of billings estate museum Big Boys:"There were businessmen in Minneapolis who had never heard of him."

The private persona of Whitney MacMillan -- a tall, handsome man with a full head of silver hair --comes as hermetically sealed as the business one. Conversations with some of his closest pals,including George Pillsbury, who is married to MacMillan's cousin, and Yale classmate G. RichardSlade, president of the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, present a picture of a quiet,competitive man who is as formidable on the tennis court as he is in business, but who remains alooffrom his own community

Besides his family -- pals say wife Elizabeth is his best friend -- his one outside passion seems to beinternational politics, particularly issues involving the Soviet Union, which he visits often. MacMillanhas been criticized privately by his fellow CEOs for not giving more time and money to cultural andcharitable organizations -- Cargill reportedly donates less than 1% of pretax income. He did,however, take the time to travel to Moscow last June with the Minneapolis Children's Theatre.

His older brother, Cargill MacMillan Jr., is just as private. Last year Cargill divorced his wife of 30years and married an executive secretary named Donna who worked at the company. As is the wayalong the shores of Lake Minnetonka, where the clan lives, the incident was kept so quiet that a yearlater a local gossip columnist had still not heard of it. Friends are not forthcoming. "That's a wholeother story," says Pillsbury cryptically. "The blind is going down."

And so ends our peek into the lives of the world's unseen billionaires. The MacMillan brothersremain an enigma, as do all the others. And that is for the best. Because, maddening as mystery is,reality might be worse. Do you want to know what dashing, dealing media mogul Rupert Murdochreally talks about at lunch? Taking up jogging, and the new diet book he just read. Sound familiar?Like maybe too familiar? Fantasy is a lot more fun. -By Nancy J. Perry