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The same persistence was demonstrated in price cuttings. In the end, of course, Standard Oil became such a stench in the public's nostrils that it was ordered dissolved into its 34 component parts in 1911, about 15 years after Mr. Rockefeller retired from active direction at 57, his health broken, his nerves shattered, his skull entirely bald. Even if Standard Oil had not felt the ax of the trustbusters, the near-monopoly would probably have been curbed in time by the independent oil companies, then riding to power on the automobile. For the vast fortune with which Mr. Rockefeller retired was founded on kerosene. He lived on to see that fortune effortlessly multiplied by gasoline. In his day kerosene for household lamps was a utility, and public resentment of its monopoly closely paralleled the later hatred of the Power Trust. But Mr. Rockefeller was never accused of writing up assets or watering stock. When the "splinters" of old Standard Oil filtered into the stockmarket after the Trust's dissolution, they were whooped skyward on the sudden realization that the value of the operating properties had been understated by hundreds of millions. As an efficient, consistent money-making machine, the Standard Oil organization has never had a peer.
Predecessor and unconscious mentor of most of the 19th-Century industrial titans, Mr. Rockefeller outlived them all. Hill. Harriman, Morgan, Frick, Carnegie carved their careers in the middle Rockefeller years. Mr. Rockefeller never heard of Henry Ford until his late 60s. The great group of Rockefeller partners and executives—Flagler, Rogers, Andrews, Brewster, Pratt, Archbold, Bedford, Moffett— has been gone for years.* But at no time by either word or gesture did Rockefeller ever indicate any regret for anything he ever did. Apparently there was a sharp and impenetrable wall between his conceptions of business and private morality.
But John D. Rockefeller, the sinister master of old Standard Oil, has long since been replaced in the public mind by John D. Rockefeller, the gentle oldster who gave away more money than any man who ever lived. For that astonishing handspring in public opinion, John Rockefeller could thank in large measure the late famed Ivy Ledbetter Lee, his longtime pressagent.
Without Ivy Lee's subtle guidance the Rockefeller giving might have been interpreted as a miser's attempt to ease his conscience—as indeed his early philanthropies were interpreted. The organization of philanthropy along strictly business lines, however, was a typical Rockefeller touch. Apart from any of his son's gifts, Mr.
Rockefeller in his lifetime gave away no less than $530,000,000. The Baptist Church was the most consistent beneficiary, but the biggest sums went to the Rockefeller Foundation ($182,000,000), the General Education Board ($129,000,000), the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial ($73,000,000), the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research ($59,000,000) and the University of Chicago ($35,000,000).
The rest of his wealth, including his estates, was transferred to his heirs, principally John D. Jr. At the time of death John D. Rockefeller was probably worth only a few million.