It was always Joe Kennedy's emphatic wish that money never be discussed, at the family dinner table or in public. "It's just not an important enough matter to talk over," he said. His assessment was much too modest. Money underlies the family's unique position in American life, although money does not fully explain it. The Kennedy wealth, like the family's political capital, is both large and arcane. TIME asked Richard J. Whalen, Kennedy's biographer (The Founding Father), to take a fresh look at the fortune on the founder's death. His report:

LONG before Joseph Kennedy's death, plans had been completed for...