a tough, but fair man a multi-billionaire one of the best men that Theodore J. Hamilton ever knew he put stipulations on who his money should go to he gave no one cash for their inheritance he wanted Jason to learn some things and prove that he had learned them before he put him in charge of his foundation In the ensuing two years, he drilled 60 more, earning a total of $1.5 millionenough to pay his creditors. He tells Red, Every day, rain or shine, I make a list of 10 things Im thankful to God for. When Red balks that he doesnt have much for which to be grateful, the man responds, You got to be grateful for the little things, otherwise youll never be grateful for nothin. Jason later begins telling Alexia the 10 things hes most grateful to God for. In August 1954 it handed over management of the Shamrock to Hilton Hotels. Watched this as well as The Ultimate Legacy and definitely preferred the latter. Membership, once near 6,000 people, had fallen by two-thirds. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. His life changed one night that spring when a girl he knew stopped for gas and brought along a pretty 16-year-old named Faustine Lee, daughter of the wealthy oilman Thomas Lee. The film is revolved around two main characters Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) who has been sent to Shawshank prison for the murder of his wife and her lover and Red (Morgan Freeman) who also was sent to Shawshank for murder has been in Shawshank a lot longer than Andy he is referred to as "the man who can get things." 752 Words 4 Pages Good Essays A ceremony featuring Pat OBrien and Texas governor Beauford Jester finally began around midnight, three hours behind schedule. After the groundbreaking for Emily's Home, Jason is recalled to the law firm for one more meeting and told he has exceeded the expectations of his dead grandfather, and he is given the final gift of $2-billion dollars, rewarding Jason not only for his completing the tasks, but for using the $100-million to help others. His spoiled and unappealing adult children receive enough to be set for life, but the status of the bulk of the estate remains a mystery. Over howls of protest from McCarthy, Mendel cut back the July 4 fireworks display. (United States). It stars Drew Fuller, Ali Hillis, Bill Cobbs, Abigail Breslin, Brian Dennehy, and James Garner in his final live action film appearance. Directed by Michael Landon Jr., The Ultimate Life is hampered by a predictable story, stereotypical characters and wooden acting. When Alexia steps out of the limousine, the limo driver that is holding the door open for her is the author, Jim Stovall, who wrote "The Ultimate Gift" and helped write "The Ultimate Life.". It stars Drew Fuller, Ali Hillis, Bill Cobbs, Abigail Breslin, Brian Dennehy, and James Garner in his final live action film appearance. Working in Texas, he gains an early mentor in a ranch. An oilman going bankrupt in Texas? He tells them that from now on, he and Hanna are going to live differently, that theyre going to stop living for themselves and do some good.. Alexia and Jason share a couple of intense lip-locks, one of which is shared at the altar. And its through reading Reds cautionary tale (which dives into the perils of such overwork) that Jason rectifies his mistake. He has videotaped an elaborate will. 3 Mikhail Fridman: $16.5 Billion [1], Mark McKenzie wrote the film's incidental music. And they are if Jason can ever find the time to actually propose to her amid his never-ending responsibilities running the Stevens Foundation. When the deadline arrived that August, however, the plant was still comatose. Bryan Burrough is a Vanity Fair special correspondent. He was on his way to a card game at the Baker Hotel. Wealth Nugget:She was born in Bangkok, grew up in South Korea and moved to the United States for high school. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Cond Nast. In Gift, the dead billionaire Red Stevens (played on tape by James Garner) posthumously instructs, via video, his playboy grandson Jason on how to live a good, meaningful life. At seven, shrieks rose from the crowd as limousines began to arrive and disgorge the celebrities. Fly it around. The inspiration for the James Dean character in, Melania Trump Apparently RSVPd F--k Off to Her Husbands Post-Arraignment Speech. He would beat the oil importers at their own game. He and Hughes ate a pancake breakfast by the Shamrocks pool. His only problem, McCarthy claimed, was new competition from low-priced Middle Eastern oil, which was imported at $1 a barrel at a time when Texas oil cost $2.65. He lauded its "tight and often compelling" screenplay, sparkling dialogue and "first-rate" production values. Wealth Nugget:He travels to developing countries to distribute hearing aids. Wealth Nugget:He is the founder of Patron and cofounder of John Paul Mitchell Systems. Rumors that McCarthy was mounting some kind of mysterious Middle Eastern excursion were already swirling when he abruptly disappeared from Houston in early November 1951. mccarthy on mystery oil junket, read *The Houston Post*s front-page story, which speculated that McCarthy might be heading to Egypt to hire the famous belly dancer Samia Gamal, who had just married a Texas playboy named Sheppard King III. When Jason's grandfather, billionaire businessman Red Stevens (James Garner) dies, Jason shows up at the reading of the will, perhaps expecting another handout. Night approached. In those last few months, in fact, there had been just one eastern writer snooping around the hotel. Wealth Nugget:He turned his familys grocery distribution company McLane Co. into an international firm before selling it to Walmart. Wealth Nugget:He co-founded Energy Transfer in 1995. Its difficult to overstate the impact of the Life and Fortune spreads, which triggered a seismic shift in the way America viewed Texas, especially its oilmen. Waiters gave up trying to wade into the crowd. Mendel moved to Houston, overseeing McCarthy Oil & Gas from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. each day and running the hotel until 11 every night. Hunts 15 children. What his grandfather leaves for him is instead a journey. His journal relates, decade by decade, how he achieved his dream as well as his realization of the toll such a compulsive ambition takes on his wife, Hanna, and their four children. McCarthy got still more headlines when the races winner, the celebrated flier Paul Mantz, scrambled through the finish-line crowds in Cleveland to claim a $10,000 bet McCarthy had made him. By the 1980s it was rarely full, and the grand soires that had once showcased Frank Sinatra and Milton Berle had long since given way to pimply bands playing the proms of teenagers from Pearland and Cypress and Houstons gritty south side. Accuses Texas Financial Firm of $8 Billion Fraud", "U.S. charges Stanford with massive Ponzi scheme", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Ultimate_Gift&oldid=1145147449, This page was last edited on 17 March 2023, at 14:40. Still, McCarthy denied he was in trouble, even as rumors swept through Houston that the Shamrock was poised to close. A portrait of McCarthy on his 50,000-acre ranch, near Uvalde, Texas, from a Life-magazine cover story about the states oil tycoons. His trendy girlfriend, Caitlin, ditches him when his credit card is rejected at a fancy restaurant, and none of his friends are willing to give him a place to stay despite him having done so many favors for them in the past. McCarthy optioned 562 parcels in and around the town, then borrowed heavily to buy five new drilling rigs, which cost $1 million. Cullen got the only Times headline, when he announced the formation of his $160 million Cullen Foundation, at the time the single largest gift ever made by a living American. Team Hehaka'a Adriano Rama, left, of Red Cloud, dribbles to the basket as Team Tatanka's Lincoln Archambault defends during the Lakota All Star game on Saturday at The Monument. Columns were rose and pink. The medias coverage of Glenn McCarthy spawned a new cultural icon, the Lone Star playboy, the swinging oilman who romances starlets between trips on his airplane to see his latest gusher. Hustling back to his land on the LaPorte highway, he began another well, only to have it ruined when rains caused an adjacent creek to overflow, flooding the site. Still, to the chagrin of those in the state who prized discretion and taste, many writers found exactly the kind of Texan they were looking for. There are the occasional outliers computers and hair products, anyone? A lesser man might have been satisfied. Houston shrugged. He returns to America and discovers that Emily's condition has deteriorated, so he arranges for Gus to host a belated Christmas celebration at his home for them. We see blood on his chest and watch as Gus tries to patch him up. Wealth Nugget:: Daughter of the late Dan Duncan, she is a board member of Houstons Hermann Park Conservancy. But lately John P. Stevens has been making news as an incubator for blue-chip business leaders. He first goes to Texas where he works on his grandfather's friend Gus Caldwell's ranch for a month, learning what hard work is. Equitable, however, was out of patience; its board decided the only way to bring McCarthys spending under control was to take control itselfgradually and in private, so as not to antagonize McCarthy or those in Texas who regarded him as a hero. The opening alone was costing him $1.5 million. Forbesmagazines new rankings of the 400 richest billionaires in America shows just how much money there is the Lone Star State. Red Stevens (James Garner) is a crusty, old billionaire who dies suddenly in an air crash. Word quickly spread through the packed lobby that the show was beginning. Pristine nostalgia, potentially worth millions, gone in a night. From Lauren Meyers/arch-ive.org. Not just any hotel: the worlds finest hotel, built for the new Texas, a mammoth, ornate structure to surpass the Waldorf-Astorias and Ritzes and Hiltons, the largest building between New York and Los Angeles, a glorious symbol not just of his own mushrooming power and confidence but of Texass as well. His journal relates, decade by decade, how he achieved his dream as well as his realization of the toll such a compulsive ambition takes on his wife, Hanna, and their four children. The Ultimate Gift is a 2006 American drama film directed by Michael O. Sajbel from a screenplay written by Cheryl McKay, which is based on the best selling novel by Jim Stovall, who cameos in the film. Out of cash and determined not to borrow from Faustines father, he decided to try his luck as a contractor, drilling wells for others. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/06/movies/the-ultimate-life-shows-what-money-can-and-cannot-buy.html, Logan Bartholomew and Ali Hillis in "The Ultimate Life. We've updated our Privacy Policy to support new EU data protection law. Like Red, then, we watch as Jason has his wake-up call regarding the reality that theres more to life than just workeven if the work youre doing is truly important. He lingered for nearly a year, finally dying, a day after his 81st birthday, on December 26, 1988. What gas McCarthy found he was unable to sell. McCarthy laughed off the questions, but signs of distress were evident. When every major grass supplier in Texas refused to hand over the 10 acres of Saint Augustine he needed to sod the Shamrocks lawnthey insisted it was needed for other customersMcCarthy simply bought one of the suppliers, trucked in a bulldozer, and laid down the grass himself. He was doing more harm than good at the hotel, and Mendel couldnt see anyone buying McCarthys oil propertieswhich appeared to be the only way Equitable could ever recoup its investmentif it meant dealing with McCarthy. McCarthy glided through the Shamrocks carpeted hallways that morning inspecting his handiwork. [12], The Ultimate Gift opened with receipts of $1.2 million on its first weekend, with final box office of $3.4 million. My wife thinks Im lost. Hamilton replies, You see, money has been your dream, but your legacy is your family. It needed immediate and total control. Hundreds of tuxedoed men and fur-clad women began to push their way into the Emerald Room, knocking over chairs and a table or two. Equitables board met and decided gradual control would no longer do. The staff appeared ready. When his rich granddad, Howard "Red" Stevens (portrayed by James Garner) died, Jason (Drew Fuller) thought he was going to inherit a piece of the old man's multi-billion dollar estate, but it came with a condition. It's a rough road to get to that point, and I'm not sure it was executed as well as it could have been, but the point still gets across. Of course, Walmart heiress Alice Walton reached the tippy top of Texas financial titans. [Spoiler Warning] Reds big turning point comes when Hamilton is involved in a car accident. The Times identified him as a Former Texas Oil Field Laborer.. McCarthy would still run things, but under the watchful eye of a comptroller Equitable brought in to oversee his finances. McCarthy had wagered $1,500 on a Texas A&M football game, but there was a mix-up; the bookie thought McCarthy had bet on the loser, not the winner. Making a movie, he discovered, wasnt nearly as difficult as finding oil. The newspapers hailed him as a Texas giant even as they tried to explain to younger readers who he had been. In time he purchased the Queen Mary entertainment complex, in Long Beach, built the Disneyland Hotel, in Anaheim, and became a founding member of Ronald Reagans Kitchen Cabinet of political advisers. So Jason plunges into the dramatic backstory of Red Stevens, starting when he was just a poor 15-year-old in Baton Rouge, La., in 1941. Unfortunately, the plant didnt work. It was a fateful choice. Wealth Nugget:This year, he gave $160 million to Yale to refurbish the Peabody Museum. September brought the strangest fracas to date. Wealth Nugget:His film production studio producedAll The Money in The World. The Ultimate Life opens three years later, with Jason (Logan Bartholomew) trying to manage his grandfathers foundation, beat back a lawsuit by greedy relatives and save his relationship with Alexia, the nurse he met in the first film. In fact, he swore to Lee he too would become an oilman. All this activity, and all the expense, had the Equitable on edge. Many Texans earned their fortune through pipelines and oil. By and large, though, the Texas playboys took home far more actresses than Oscars. There is an inheritance, in fact, but it comes with a condition: Jason must complete 12 separate assignments within a year in order to get it. Pat OBrien! Nothing worked. Wealth Nugget:In 2013, he donated $25 million to the University of Texas McCombs Business School. No other Texas oilman ever rose so high or fell so hard. No matter how hard he tried, he realized, he couldnt best the Equitable, not with his fists, and not in court. Alexia wants to believe things are moving toward marriage. They had decided to call it the Shamrock, after The Houston Post ran a naming contest, and everything about it was to be Irish-themed: the dining areas the Shamrock Room and the Emerald Room, the nightclub the Cork Club. For a long time the only indication he was even alive came in the odd stories that floated up from South America every few months, none of which, as with the case of an Ecuadoran doctor he attacked in a drunken rage on a flight to La Paz, suggested Glenn McCarthy was going gentle into that night. Equitables board arm-twisted McCarthy into downsizing the Shamrock project, eliminating the apartment buildings, the shopping center, the grocery, the drugstore, and the theater, leaving only the hotel, which was fine by McCarthy. McCarthy eventually hit oil for Anderson at Conroe, and he soon had a car, a larger apartment, and a reputation. Wealth Nugget:Daughter of the late Dan Duncan, she sits on the board of the University of Texas Health Science Center. He was a man, and he took a good deal of pride in the fact. Glenn not only held himself and the two others securely, Mr. Anderson said, sputtering, he then maneuvered the lowering of all three to the ground. McCarthy had suffered friction burns on both hands, sliding down the derrick to safety. On Tuesday, with two days left, McCarthy flew to Los Angeles to fetch his friend Howard Hughes and finalize travel arrangements for the movie stars. And it turns out, of course, that Alexia is way ahead of Jason, having traded her nursing job in the U.S. for the chance to serve the poor in Haiti. McCarthys real passion, though, appeared to be bourbon. Red Stevens : Jason, any process worth going through will get tougher before it gets easier. Red's attorney and friend, Mr. Hamilton, and his secretary, Miss Hastings, attempt to guide Jason along the path his grandfather wishes him to travel. Wealth Nugget:He and this three older siblings inherited a stake in their father Dan Duncans pipeline firm, Enterprise. They called the well Longe No. Wealth Nugget:He ran for president in 1992 and 1996. *Fortune*s April issue went a step further, painting a portrait of oil millionaires popping up daily across the Southwest, especially in Texas. Trying to find guidance dealing with his family and a strained relationship, Jason starts reading his grandfather's journal. Bill Gates. Each assignment is centered around a "gift". Wealth Nugget:He stepped down as co-CEO of Energy Transfer in 2007, but he still owns six percent of the company. The story of Glenn McCarthy, once Houstons greatest wildcatter, had one final chapter. He refused to take a penny of Lee money. He had a script ready to film, The Green Promise, the story of a young girls struggle to save her familys farm. City: Dallas. The Ultimate Life is the unsought follow-up to The Ultimate Gift, the 2007 film adaptation of Jim Stovalls sermon as novel. His father, an itinerant oil-field worker and plumber, shuttled the family between Beaumont and Houstons rough Third Ward; at one point, young Glenn was the Howard Hughes familys paperboy. Rachel Stevens shuts down 'lies' from ex-fianc Jeremy Edwards after he said he . From 1948 until well into the 1950s their articles crowded every periodical of the day, from Time and Colliers to glossy spreads in Holiday, and piece after piece in the Times. McCarthy insisted he couldnt pay unless allowed to develop New Ulm. As a gas-station manager, McCarthy was by every account a force of nature. Between appearances he purchased a steel factory in Detroit, Houstons largest radio station, and a string of newspapers. [13] Other songs include "Gotta Serve Somebody" by Bob Dylan, "The Thrill is Gone" by B.B. Sign up to receive free Oil & Gas 360 Newsletters. Source of wealth: Computer services, real estate. His name was Glenn McCarthy. When McCarthy couldnt pay his rigs rental fee, the owner secured an injunction preventing its use. But the big event, the announcement that introduced much of Houston to the McCarthy whirlwind, was the hotels groundbreaking. Inspired by Andrew Carnegie, Red (Drew Waters), who grows up dirt poor in Depression-era Louisiana, is determined to be a billionaire. He thanks her for the help that she and her daughter gave him. Weve all been on the road with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope but never through anything like this, she snapped. Then OBrien couldnt be found. As good as he was at drilling, McCarthy, whose own father had grown poor working on other mens wells, knew he could never become wealthy unless he worked for himself. Net worth: $27.5 billion Dietrich Mateschitz, cofounder and CEO of the ubiquitous Red Bull energy drinks, holds a 49% stake in the beverage company. By 1942, McCarthy was back drilling his own wells. Its the greatest hotel the world has ever known, he told a reporter. Jason isnt as naturally driven by ambition as his grandfather was. By Dmitri Kessel/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images. The plan was to announce OBriens appearance at 7:45 over the hotels public-address system, at which point the crowd would file to their tables in the ballrooms. The Texans came pouring in as well, the governor and a string of politicians, oilmen, bankers, and Amon Carter with a delegation from Fort Worth. A billionaire with questionable priorities re-examines his life after discovering his grandfather's journal.A billionaire with questionable priorities re-examines his life after discovering his grandfather's journal.A billionaire with questionable priorities re-examines his life after discovering his grandfather's journal. man whispered. The Shamrock was as big as McCarthy had hoped, a gray granite colossus 18 stories high and almost as wide. In an act of comic desperation, he began calling an imaginary horse race: And a big crowd is here tonight at Santa Anita. Lamour pleaded for him to stop. James Dean as Jett Rink, a character based on McCarthy, in the 1956 film Giant. Overnight the Shamrock became the dominant symbol not only of Houston but of Texas. Wealth Nugget:He founded the Bonderman Travel Fellowship at the University of Washington to sponsor fellows to travel to at least six countries in eight months. In time the man, impressed with McCarthys tenacity, agreed, but the deal was harsh: Sinclair would take almost all profits from gasoline sales. Auditors uncovered telltale hints of financial chicanery. A scant three years after its celebrated opening, the Shamrock was no longer Glenn McCarthys. Frank Lloyd Wright, attending a convention in Houston that week, took the tour, and emerged in a daze. City: Houston. A thousand people attended his memorial service, where a bar singer from the Shamrocks glory days led renditions of Youll Never Walk Alone and Londonderry Air. They buried him in Houstons Glenwood Cemetery, steps from the grave of Howard Hughes. a tough, but fair man a multi-billionaire one of the best men that Theodore J. Hamilton ever knew he put stipulations on who his money should go to he gave no one cash for their inheritance he wanted Jason to learn some things and prove that he had learned them before he put him in charge of his foundation Based on the novel by Jim Stovall, "The Ultimate Gift" is a motivational journey of self-discovery. Lamour, now joined by Van Heflin and a comic named Ed Gardner, tried to get the crowds attention, but it was no use. The first billionaire ever is thought to be Standard Oil magnate John D. Rockefeller back in 1916, or perhaps Henry Ford in 1925.. Fast forward some 100 years to 2021: As the COVID-19 pandemic continued to rage, a record-breaking 660 people became billionaires globally, growing the previous year's number by 30%.. Somehow McCarthy managed to wheedle a rig on credit, but the following week it rained so hard it took 11 days just to drag it to the site. The McCarthy Center, as he called it, would consist of the hotel, apartment buildings, a theater, and a shopping center. He had a family now, four girls with a little boy on the way, and while never exactly faithful to Faustine, he was a good father, staging impromptu plays for the kids and wrestling with them. When a dumbfounded NBC producer told one matron she was interrupting the broadcast, the woman snatched the microphone from Lamour. It looked as though McCarthy would turn Hollywood topsy-turvy with his ambitious production plans. McCarthy then embarked on a manic tour of Hollywood parties and nightspots, befriending a slew of stars, from Errol Flynn to John Wayne. "[11] William Arnold of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer wrote: "Its sincerity, optimism and air of open-minded tolerance go down well, and it makes a nice change-of-pace." The second, to McCarthy, would be for a jaw-dropping $22 million, among the largest loans Equitables board had ever approved. Texas reporters quickly discovered that McCarthy, with his dashing mustache and good looks, was eminently quotablean entirely different animal from taciturn Hugh Roy Cullen or other press-shy Texas oilmen. Hesold the Houston Rocketsto Tilman Fertitta for $2.2 billion last year. He moved his offices into the Shell building, taking up the entire sixth floor, and hired a public-relations man, a Houston radio veteran named Fred Nahas; if McCarthy so much as burped, Nahas made sure it got into the papers. His only asset of value was the Shamrocks aging nightclub, his beloved Cork Club, which was owned by its members. Austin boasts six and one Brownsville billionaire made the cut. Floodlights crisscrossed the night sky, just as McCarthy had dreamed they would. ". Red ink was to be expected in any new venture, but McCarthys spending was simply out of control. Red Stevens : [chuckling] Yeah, well, you don't begin to live until you've lost everything.

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