Businessman and philanthropist

Born: June 12, 1915;

Died: March 20, 2017

DAVID Rockefeller, who has died aged 101, was an American billionaire businessman and the last of his generation of Rockefellers, the most famous philanthropic family in the world.

He was the grandson of Standard Oil co-founder John D Rockefeller and the youngest of five sons and one daughter born to John D Rockefeller Jr. He was also the guardian of his family's fortune and head of a sprawling network of family interests, both business and philanthropic, that ranged from environmental conservation to the arts.

Unlike his brothers Nelson, the governor of New York who hungered for the White House and was briefly vice president, and Winthrop, a governor of Arkansas, David Rockefeller wielded power and influence without ever seeking public office. Among his many accomplishments were spurring the project that led to the World Trade Centre.

Rockefeller graduated from Harvard in 1936 and received a doctorate in economics from the University of Chicago in 1940. He served in the army during the Second World War, then began climbing the ranks of management at Chase Bank. That bank merged with the Manhattan company in 1955 and Rockefeller was named Chase Manhattan's president in 1961 and chairman and chief executive eight years later. He retired in 1981 aged 65 after a 35-year career.

In his role of business statesman, Rockefeller preached capitalism at home and favoured assisting economies abroad on the grounds that bringing prosperity to the Third World would create customers for American products. He parted company with some of his fellow capitalists on income taxes, calling it unseemly to earn a million and then find ways to avoid paying the taxes. In 2015, Forbes magazine estimated his fortune at three billion dollars.

As one of the Rockefeller grandchildren, David belonged to the last generation in which the inherited family billions were concentrated in a few hands. The next generation, known as "the cousins", are more numerous.

Mr Rockefeller was estimated to have met more than 200 rulers in more than 100 countries during his lifetime, and was often treated as if he were a visiting head of state.

In his early travels to South Africa, Mr Rockefeller arranged clandestine meetings with several underground black leaders. "I find it terribly important to get overall impressions beyond those I get from businessmen," he said.

But Rockefeller took a lot of heat for his bank's substantial dealings with South Africa's white separatist regime and for helping the deposed, terminally ill Shah of Iran come to New York for medical treatment in 1979, the move that triggered the 13-month US embassy hostage crisis in Tehran.

Rockefeller maintained the family's patronage of the arts, including its long-standing relationship with the Museum of Modern Art, which his mother had been a fervent patron of. His private art collection was once valued at 500 million dollars.

The Rockefeller estate at Kykuit, overlooking the Hudson River north of New York City, is the repository of four generations of family history, including Nelson's art and sculpture collection.

His philanthropy and other activities earned him a Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honour, in 1998.

Mr Rockefeller and his wife, the former Margaret McGrath, were married in 1940 and had six children - David Jr, Richard, Abby, Neva, Margaret and Eileen. His wife, an active conservationist, died in 1996.