The Forbes magazine annual list of 400 wealthiest Americans has been out for a few weeks now, and as expected the list includes five billionaires who own property on Mount Desert Island. The five were on the magazine's list last year, too.
The top such person is Edward Johnson of Fidelity Investments. Johnson, 80, owns a summer retreat near Somesville and, with an estimated net worth of $7.1 billion, is ranked 33rd. He lives in Boston and was tied for 30th in 2009.
Next highest on MDI is Charles Butt, 72, a San Antonio resident who owns a seasonal waterfront home on Northeast Harbor. Butt, whose family made its fortune with Texas-based HEB supermarkets, has an estimated net worth of $5.3 billion, which ranks him in 50th place - up from 65th in 2009. Butt is known around here for owning a large apple tree that was transported very slowly by flatbed truck from Ellsworth to MDI in June 2003, causing a massive traffic jam that made many people hours late to work. He later bought a newspaper ad to apologize for the snafu.
Robert Bass is tied for 74th on the list with four other billionaires, three of them with the last name of Ziff. Bass, who with his brothers inherited a family fortune made in oil, has an estimated worth of $4 billion and owns a house in Seal Harbor. Bass is 62, spends the winter in Forth Worth, Texas, and was ranked 65th in 2009.
The next MDI property owner on the list is Mitchell Rales, who is building a huge waterfront compound in Northeast Harbor where the home of deceased Washington socialite Susan Mary Alsop used to be. He bought the Peabody Drive property for $5.5 million in 2005 and - according to his local building permit - is spending $12.5 million on his new mansion, though some suggest it may be more than that.
Rales, 54, and his brother Stephen (ranked 159th) both live in Washington D.C. and co-own and control Danaher Corp., a manufacturing conglomerate you've probably never heard of. Mitchell Rales's estimated worth is $2.6 billion, which ranks him 135th. He was tied for 123rd on the 2009 list.
The last MDI billionaire on the list is the oldest in age and in family presence on the island. David Rockefeller Sr., 95, is ranked 153rd with an estimated fortune of $2.4 billion. The Rockefellers have owned land on MDI for a century or more. A resident of New York City, Rockefeller owns a waterfront home in Seal Harbor and was in a seven-way tie for 147th richest American in 2009.
There are many other extremely wealthy people who summer on MDI, but the cut-off point for making the Forbes list this year appears to be $1 billion. Maybe more MDI landowners will appear on the list one day. One or more already here could have their fortunes soar yet more, or like Rales someone already on the list might decide this is where they want to purchase a slice of the Maine coast. If they want to spend several million dollars to build gigantic house, too, local contractors won't mind.
Incidentally, Forbes (which seems to enjoy compiling lists of rankings) recently said
Maine was the worse state in the nation for doing business, according to the BDN. Five billionaires buying food and fuel- and sometimes huge amount of building materials - on MDI isn't enough to save the state's economy, apparently.
I found this article while browsing around online this morning, and was a little surprised to see that this controversial practice is happening in Passamaquoddy Bay, which is split between the U.S. and Canada. I'm curious about what Maine's lobster industry might think of the use of pesticides, which many fishermen think is responsible for the 1990s die-off of lobster in Long Island Sound. That pesticide was used on land to combat mosquitos, and I honestly have no idea if it is similar to Alphamax or not. But I know some island communities have prohibited large, mosquito-oriented pesticide campaigns within their borders because of concerns of how it might affect local lobster populations.
