They've done well, and now they're doing good
Since 1991, Neva R. Goodwin has been teaching at Tufts University, where she co-directs its Global Development and Environment Institute, and publishes earnest papers about sustainable economics. She is also the coauthor of a Whole Earth version of an introductory economics textbook, a la Samuelson/Krugman/Mankiw.
Ten days ago, Neva Goodwin took off her mask. At a press conference in midtown Manhattan, she declared: I am a Rockefeller, the great-granddaughter of the founder of Standard Oil, I am mad as hell, and I am not going to take it any more. In somewhat more genteel language, Goodwin publicly criticized the $400 billion oil and gas giant ExxonMobil, the successor company to John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust, for ignoring alternative energy investment opportunities outside of its core fossil fuel business. Quoting her ancestor, she said, "If you want to succeed, you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success."
Specifically, Goodwin introduced a shareholder resolution urging Exxon to take "leadership in developing sustainable energy technologies that can be used by and for the benefit of those most threatened by climate change." Her brother and fellow Cambridge resident David co-filed that resolution. Her sister Abby, also of Cambridge, co-filed a similar resolution calling on ExxonMobil to "adopt a policy for renewable energy research, development and sourcing."
ExxonMobil kissed off the yappy Rockefellers, 15 in all, calling them "shareholders like any other." A spokesman told the Associated Press that the dissidents owned only 0.006 percent of the company shares. "That is a very disingenuous number," Goodwin says, explaining that when family trust holdings are factored in, "the total of ExxonMobil shares are very much larger than that."
The ExxonMobil press event was a rare coming out party for the hyper-liberal, secretive children of former Chase Manhattan chairman David Rockefeller. Abby, who calls herself a "homemaker" and "self-employed environmental activist" in public filings, has been running Lawrence-based Clivus Multrum, a composting toilet business, since the early 1970s. After a not-very-respectful profile in The Wall Street Journal in 1975 ("A Five-Gallon Flush Is Not In the Cards on Abby's Premises"), she has generally avoided the press. She hosts occasional fund-raisers for liberal causes, and donates money to Democrats running for office nationwide.
David Jr. keeps a low profile as a backer of the Cantata Singers and of such worthy nonprofits as Afghan Women Leaders Connect and Sailors for the Sea, an eco-oriented charity set up to "empower sailors and other boaters to preserve, protect, and enjoy the harbors." His picture recently appeared in The
David, Abby, and Eileen could not be reached for comment.
What prompted Goodwin to come out? "It was a tough decision to make," she said. "I am 63 and I've tried to live quietly, but this issue seemed to me tremendously important. I have totally blown my cover. There is real concern that Exxon could run into real trouble and may be ignoring opportunities as well as ignoring risks to its future."
Couldn't she be accused of acting purely out of self-interest, as a great deal of her family's worth is in Exxon stock? "This is a fortunate situation where our financial interest happens to be aligned with what is good for the world," Goodwin said.
I asked what kind of feedback she has had on campus, where she is Professor Goodwin, not Rockefeller. "I got a nice e-mail from the provost," she answered. "He said that Tufts was very proud of me."
More un-idle rich
Peter Lawson-Johnston was in the Berkshires recently, talking about his book, "Growing Up Guggenheim." He is the grandson of Solomon Guggenheim, who founded the famous museum.
The book has some good gossip about Thomas Krens, the Williams College art impresario whom Guggenheim credits with radically upgrading the Williams College Museum of Art (it's very good) and bamboozling the Massachusetts Legislature into financing North Adams's vast Museum of Contemporary Art (full of rubbish). Krens went on to become director of the Guggenheim Museum.
Guggenheim writes that when the trustees hired Krens in 1986 there was talk of jointly managing Mass MOCA and the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed temple on Fifth Avenue; "Provincial New Yorkers, of course, feared a major museum in their city might become an appendage of some project in the boondocks of New England."
Alex Beam is a Globe columnist. His e-dress is beam@globe.com.
