John Davison Rockefeller

约翰·戴维森·洛克菲勒（英语：John Davison Rockefeller，1839年7月8日－1937年5月23日），美国实业家，慈善家，因革新了石油工业和塑造了慈善事业现代化结构而闻名。1870年创立标准石油，在全盛期垄断了全美90%的石油市场，成为历史上的第一位亿万富豪与全球首富。1914年巅峰时，其财富总值达到美国GDP的2.4%(9亿美元，美国GDP365亿美元)，折合今日之4000亿美元以上，普遍被视为西方世界史上首富。

他受到记者与各种舆论的攻击，标准石油最后被判决违反反托拉斯法并在1911年被拆分为34家公司（事实上，反托拉斯法正是针对标准石油而制定的）。规模之巨大，其后继企业之一埃克森美孚在百年后的今天仍是全美第2大企业。

另一方面，洛克菲勒在人生的后40年致力于慈善事业，主要是教育和医药领域，而在1897年结束对标准石油的直接管理。他出资成立洛克菲勒研究所资助医学研究，主要贡献包括；成立约翰霍普金斯公共卫生学院、哈佛大学公共卫生学院、北京协和医学院，根除北美钩虫和黄热病，赞助野口英世的梅毒病原体研究，赞助亚历山大·弗莱明的青霉素研究。他也对黑人族群特别关照，斥巨资提升黑人教育。他是虔诚的北浸礼会教友，并支持了很多教会背景的机构。

今天的两所美国顶尖大学：芝加哥大学与洛克菲勒大学都是他创办的。现今的纽约市也有许多洛克菲勒家族出资建立的地标，如联合国总部大楼、洛克菲勒中心等等。

洛克菲勒坚信他人生的目的是“尽力地赚钱，尽力地存钱，尽力地捐钱”。他以许多负面手段成为了空前绝后的巨富，但他私生活严谨，终身不烟不酒，一生勤俭自持，在晚年将大部分财产捐出资助慈善事业，开美国富豪行善之先河，给今天如比尔·盖茨与沃伦·巴菲特等富豪写下了先例，成为美国近代史上最富传奇色彩与争议性的人物之一。

John Davison Rockefeller Sr. (July 8, 1839 – May 23, 1937) was an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is widely considered the wealthiest American of all time, and the richest person in modern history.

Rockefeller was born into a large family in upstate New York that moved several times before eventually settling in Cleveland, Ohio. He became an assistant bookkeeper at age 16 and went into several business partnerships beginning at age 20, concentrating his business on oil refining. Rockefeller founded the Standard Oil Company in 1870. He ran it until 1897, and remained its largest shareholder.

Rockefeller's wealth soared as kerosene and gasoline grew in importance, and he became the richest person in the country, controlling 90% of all oil in the United States at his peak.^[c] Oil was used throughout the country as a light source until the introduction of electricity, and as a fuel after the invention of the automobile. Furthermore, Rockefeller gained enormous influence over the railroad industry which transported his oil around the country. Standard Oil was the first great business trust in the United States. Rockefeller revolutionized the petroleum industry and, through corporate and technological innovations, was instrumental in both widely disseminating and drastically reducing the production cost of oil. His company and business practices came under criticism, particularly in the writings of author Ida Tarbell.

The Supreme Court ruled in 1911 that Standard Oil must be dismantled for violation of federal antitrust laws. It was broken up into 34 separate entities, which included companies that became ExxonMobil, Chevron Corporation, and others—some of which still have the highest level of revenue in the world.

In the end it turned out that the individual segments of the company were worth more than the entire company was when it was one entity — the sum of the parts were worth more than the whole – as shares of these doubled and tripled in value in their early years. Consequently, Rockefeller became the country's first billionaire, with a fortune worth nearly 2% of the national economy. His peak net worth was estimated at US$418 billion (in 2019 dollars; inflation-adjusted) in 1913.^[d] His personal wealth was estimated at $900 million at the time in 1913, which was almost 3% of the US GDP of $39.1 billion that year.

Rockefeller spent much of the last 40 years of his life in retirement at his estate in Westchester County, New York, defining the structure of modern philanthropy, along with other key industrialists such as steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. His fortune was mainly used to create the modern systematic approach of targeted philanthropy through the creation of foundations that had a major effect on medicine, education, and scientific research. His foundations pioneered developments in medical research and were instrumental in the near-eradication of hookworm and yellow fever in the United States.

Rockefeller was also the founder of the University of Chicago and Rockefeller University and funded the establishment of Central Philippine University in the Philippines. He was a devout Northern Baptist and supported many church-based institutions. He adhered to total abstinence from alcohol and tobacco throughout his life. For advice, he relied closely on his wife Laura Spelman Rockefeller with whom he had five children. He was a faithful congregant of the Erie Street Baptist Mission Church, taught Sunday school, and served as a trustee, clerk, and occasional janitor. Religion was a guiding force throughout his life and he believed it to be the source of his success. Rockefeller was also considered a supporter of capitalism based on a perspective of social Darwinism, and he was quoted often as saying, "The growth of a large business is merely a survival of the fittest".