Conversation with James Day; 2; John D. Rockefeller III

owner thank you it is said of the rockefellers that john deasy year made the money and john d jr gave it away as with most over some provocations are some truth in this but only some john d rockefeller sr did of course become america's first billionaire but it was he who set up what is now the second largest philanthropic foundation in america his philanthropic work was carried on and broadened by his son and is now carried on by his five grandsons the eldest of the grandson's is john davison ran afoul of the third born and reared in newark city educated of

browning school in manhattan and the luma school in connecticut and graduated from princeton university in nineteen twenty nine where incidentally his glass elected him the man most likely to succeed in that same year he was one of four young man selected to be a junior secretary at a conference of the institute for civic relations injured then that visit and a trip around the world still in an interest in international affairs that i'm protected within the orient which has deepened over the years as with each of his brother's nelson lawrence when falcon david jundi the third has found his own special areas of interest in a certain age leadership capacity on a variety of boards too long to catalogue here is chairman of the board of the rockefeller foundation and was appointed by the president to the board of directors of the corporation for public broadcasting when not engaged in one of his many

philanthropic enterprises mr rockefeller lives modestly we're told on a cattle breeding farm near tarrytown new york at rockefeller your brother was quoted as having said in an article i've never thought of a problem to be a rockefeller would you agree with your brother in those respects why would feel a strong advantages and there are some situations where one with a little less comfortable in that one was just an ordinary citizen now the greek i would suspect that the advantages may be rather obvious where does it work to your disadvantage where being an ordinary citizen might be a bit easier like an entrapment sometime one was to just be a tourist in an area and one finds one is somewhat singled out for special attention to advantage

is there to avoid is at any disadvantage the kind of work you do for the most part you travel a good deal of course you're here in san francisco meeting with a wide variety of these loans eventually going to hunter's point chinatown places of the sort is a disadvantage an advantage in this respect now now now when you say in the public realm related organizations sometimes in the fundraising side i'm told that if some number of my families involved with the activity is a feeling that maybe the finances on his pricing as they would be otherwise so that has sometimes disadvantages elements to it and the likelihood of one member of your family being involved i suspect another identity cases is is there a special obligation to being a rockefeller and carrying the name the history that must impose

certain obligations on sale now coming down from my grandfather who was the atmosphere of this jewish stewardship for the family means to day has its price from generation to generation it's not just for us in our pleasures there's a sense of public responsibility in the use of it and that element is carried through from generation to generation i think in a very meaningful constructive way but that is there a special element in the picture that you're question brings out you know of course i know your grandfather <unk> iranian i suppose he was in his later years one you were most conscious of his influence and impressive i was born in nineteen sixty died and they said isis so we're kind of man do you remember

him b i'm thinking critically of your childhood years of my wonderful person kind of a general sense if you will really love to tell stories like to tell jokes starting out in an atmosphere of seriousness and then coming to its climax what kind of relationship did you have with his grandson's one always thinks of the grandfather building upon the grandson's may not have been the responsibility of the father as sometimes was he this kind of grandfather was the one who was who counseled you for example as young men not particularly he was always warm and friendly and informal with this we used often go to needles with him are going to stay with him when he was in florida never a sense of

making us feel that he was telling us what to do preaching til it's warm and responsive accessible but we had orcas highest feeling of just being formed in an article that you wrote in surgery review i recently last year as a matter of this was about young people and ashley more about the article later but i did pick up this one quotation i cannot stress too strongly my belief that children learn much more about what their parents do them from what they say was this occasion your own childhood and your father your grandfather's well i believe for a model of what we want to see a model that i feel we learned more through that side than we did through what we were told their ability to do or not to do to me it's the most compelling

approach as far as the parent child relationship has concerns you've mentioned this responsibility that is the rockefellers the responsibility to the public that you feel is passed down from generation to generation where the six of you know mentions been made so far the fact that you have a sister is one of four brothers were the six of you had in any sense groomed for the responsibility which you were to take on as you grew older from your father i'm sure that was in iraq parents mind but you can show that a conscious of it as such and in the ones this atmosphere of the stewardship which is part of what you're saying but no one thinks the royal family is the responsibility that so obviously is coming there what we had no atmosphere are training at that time to do

so again it wasn't a burden but we were aware of the special op to use them and the special responsibilities to what extent of this question was untroubled to what extent did each of you pursue your own predilections your own interests you when you want to princeton i noticed the major economics history was this a a matter of a sense of the responsibility you might have or simply your own national interest know that was my own own interest but last impression generally speaking we all without question did pursue our own inclinations are home lines of interest was a little different situation on starting off i was the you're the oldest rights actually my father had been an only son so you know automatically gone in with his father due to do whatever he could to help his father i happen to be the first of my brothers

and my father assumed that i would do that which i did up until the second world war was just joining in with him on any of these activities where he felt i could be helpful but after that night french town hall why what why what the simon morley point at which you write about on the wealthy that the war made a major in political ads and all of this went away from my normal pursue your baby during an aneurism matter and when i came back it gave a chance to take a fresh look at what i was doing actually so many of the family introduced by the rockefeller foundation rock collections to rock sandy or williamsburg world came in my direction and after the war my brothers and i felt that we should divide up the family introduced each one taking leadership and the one seemed most appropriate so in a sense you do each have your own choice although i suspect there was still a certain aura of responsibility that

each of you had to take on certain things that you might not but that was within the family address which is only a small segment of our own personal activities there it seems on the surface at least no spirit of competition among the five brothers there is that doesn't that doesn't appear to be in the research which we have there's always been that way even in their younger years but the way it's worked out we've all been in such different things like politics thanking so it hasn't seemed like sort of a parallel effort so generally speaking i grew but i imagine it's not you were not do to theologians have to from the fact that there are other members of the family of one's own generation each working in their own for you

but basically at your statement is correct as i was saying at the outset of the problem in your introduction where you first danger in qwest apparently international affairs we're visiting panama so you're shaking your head as though but were in fact rather important and so between my junior and senior college i spent the summer in geneva as the staff worker and the secretary out of the league of nations and that was my first exposure on the international crime and that was a tremendously meaningful one and that was followed up by the trip which you mentioned the next year after i graduated i took this trip around the world lasting for months including this conference in kyoto of the instant pacific relations at which i was the services sector services sector that apparently had a profound influence upon of your life and the direction which subsequently why i went

with this older man who was then head of the foreign policy association in the yard and he was taking the trip is as pointed his job to interview leaders in the various countries we want and what have the kind of exposure i've never had before and i went with him on all the meetings and it did open my eyes in a way that was at that age very meaningful and also made me aware of the problems of the world and i imagine that's one of the elements that started me on my population kind of interest one can certainly appreciate that this would be an unusual opportunity the leaders i suppose the assumption is also easily made that growing up is you have a famous family that other famous people would be around you all the time was this not the case an addict at all the

taiwanese people would come in and my family would invite the children and did any of these have any particular employees none would i should suspend our fathers strong measures was that this would be the major influence of the main point and in most of these were with casually as you say people are coming for dinner are some function but it was a good exposure they've just mentioned that it was this trip around the world's first give your interest in population control at what let the sled privacy is today one of you are consuming he's the one population stabilization the world word control we talk about birth control population control and so the negative rating tool and

maybe find government's plan is to control the media family planning and poor population question should be thought of possibly as the basis for the enrichment of line not the restriction of life there's a phrase that's being used more these days that the quality of life and to me unless we have to stabilize population we would not obtain the levels that we could be assured in terms of quality of life or who is the enemy you write i've never thought of it quiet in those terms the enemy but to meet the dead are sorry i suppose to me today that too key problems towards the forward motion of family planning a one a better more effective contraceptive simpler the other

is the recognition by the world leaders the heads of governments that they mistakenly tissue within their countries to the development of programs under the magnet to to do the kind of job that must be done to another article why justin this yes it was a speech about an article there goes back to nineteen fifty three you a blender four point code of conduct for the united states included in that was first to refrain from a tendency to impose our ideas were a way of life on other people's not quite obviously you don't feel the population stabilization isn't any sense the imposition of our ideas on other people know i'm at the point you make is to roll on because our nation is so big and so thoughtful and the thing we do i say with other glittered its yawning

has the danger of that and that makes me a lot more concerned that we only respond to other countries against of their requests their approach to us our assistant and also it makes me realize the importance that we act out at home in regard to the population probably we should but i think it also has the psychological daniel abroad believe they know we're concerned and moving forward here they realize it isn't something that we're dreaming up especially for that and tied with this in addition to the quality of life and as a part of a quality of life as a supposedly an enormous economic problem that being posed by nine and stabilize the forward motion of so many countries depends to a large extent and their time

now stabilizing their populations because the fourth of these points that i mentioned a moment ago is recognize the success or failure of one people increasingly effects of paul and it's a responsibility of all which is to say that the problem posed in the underdeveloped areas of the world and the widening gap between the department develop various porches while the greatest threats in the world today unless he considered by all of this is common concern income <unk> difficult to give away money effectively the most people and we said what's really tough life it sees the yearning of money that the giving away and out of their intellect and my own belief is that that one can do that much harm in giving money wrongly as you can do good and giving it rightly so i believe that the same

careful thinking and planning and the syrians should go into that giving up money as is in may making money is an element of creativity and grants mentioned was a terrific opportunity for creativity mean he doesn't want america to me there are two kinds of giving this sort of what i call citizenship giving which is giving to community organizations like a hospital a boy scouts whether they've established operations and you do your share in relation to there's the other which i've tended called special interests giving where you're pursuing areas that have special concern to special meaning to an end those in the areas i believe where your point about creativity as the greatest opportunity is concerned what has been voiced most

recently in congress about the the social engineering so to speak and then the term i suspect there's some cement foundation to carry on the kinds of changes they can affect whether graham's not sure if you're referring to recent publicity in relation to the ways and means committee hearing that's right i suspect is the question that's been raised recently but i suspect will be raised again and again that's dr i testified before the committee and i made that point that i think is responsive to your question that because our problems today are so big and so complex that every element of our society is needed to resolve them and obviously government has to carry the biggest load i think of urban problems only thing is that private initiative and the private initiative is

philanthropy can play a tremendously important point that they bring a special approach that can be very useful now when you have government working on a problem and private initiative working on you do have potentially an into relationships there but actually it's a new element when i've got to get it realm of political overtones and i think those are a matter of concern to those of us on the philanthropy site and to government as well and i think that's what the ways and means committee the congress is worrying about now and we are too and i'm more sympathetic with their concerns on the other hand once on concern to do anything that would inhibit freedom of private initiative in the coping with problems is to me it's one of the great strengths of our system no end of the organization

rockefeller brothers incorporated you and your brothers have used the money to help the high risk industries get going in your philanthropic work due regard high risk as i'm as important to you i do the venture capital is this very common term i like to think of venture philanthropy in the same way and to me it's this willingness to risk his ability to raise that makes the private initiative by that is so important in the resolution some of these problems that we strongly believe in that kind of approach i should think with the kind of power in a sense the philanthropy at scale of the rockefeller fortune that represent that one would sometimes feel that he wasn't he didn't know all he ought to know there's so

much more to know because of the applications that are possible witnesses do you feel that of course i think that's true of like generally with most of the questions were asked to resolve every second i guess is faced with a society that's right but i do think though it's a tougher one in the philanthropic if you're in business you have to balance sheet and you can always check how you doing by the volunteers and the philanthropic front there's nothing comparable do to check out a delay often only time will really give you the answer and my feeling is this is a complicating factor and that this new approach of the valuation building an evaluation project says it's an important step forward to most americans that i suspect that our highest motivation is

security and that implies money when you're born with that security alert what is the motivation that gives life meaning and excitement to me i mean i've don't disagree with your point i think it's true but i do think the average american anyway has an urge to accomplish something to attain a position of respect in the community and you recognized that somebody a little above the other so and i think this surge which is a positive urge to show the big eyes and the negative is motivating factor that there is this the hearings in washington somebody made a study of the basis of philanthropic giving and he pointed out the matter of

the tax advantage with something like six on the ledge the other factors were the primary ones in people's decision to kiev or to another ways to help their fellow citizens we all have to have a feeling of usefulness to others i suspect syed possesses the self interest by science can to feel weird constructive and helpful in moving forward in athens of society you've been involved in the senate and so many different kinds of enterprises not all philanthropic cars and maybe this is an unfair question but at this point in your life is there one one one activity that has given you the kind of satisfaction you spoke of a moment ago more than the others vying to have to

choose cause i have been fortunate in being exposed on several fronts that i felt were exciting and important and meaningful to me but i think if i had to pick one at the moment it it would be the population question that gets to maybe some key so underlying to the future that all of us in terms of the quality of life and death is so relatively little being done about it anywhere in the world forty five countries that have programs really national insecurity and promising results of a really significant challenge along seven suits and trying to get involved in the problem is and then try to find ways to be helpful you were challenges that i thought quite in that structure for a babe

rockefeller family has been challenged and in my research i'm quite amazed to discover the ways in various ways in which it's not these challenges and i suspect that your own family you have children of your own for are likewise wound perhaps unconsciously where their father's example to assume the responsibility or maybe there's work will definitely do you have a sense of responsibility that comes out of us and thank you very much this program was recorded in april nineteen sixty

nine he's eighty the pittsburgh