New Haven, Connecticut born Sarah Winchester became one of the wealthiest women in the world after the death of her Winchester Repeating Arms Company heir husband, William Wirt Winchester, in 1882. With a 50% holding in the rifle making manufacturer plus a legacy equivalent to £426 million ($529 million) in 2020, this true eccentric – whose only child died aged just one – took the advice of a medium and moved west to California.
Here, in San Jose, this grief obsessed and beyond superstitious, American equivalent of Queen Victoria spent the remainder of her life constructing a mansion that she believed would appease the spirits of her relatives and those of the victims of Winchester weaponry. Known as ‘The Winchester Mystery House’ and built (but never completed) between 1884 and 1922 at a cost estimated at the equivalent of £57 million ($71 million) today. Starting from an 8 room farmhouse, the property grew to 24,000 square foot and eventually included 10,000 windows, 2,000 doors, 160 rooms, 52 skylights, 47 stairways (some leading absolutely nowhere), 17 chimneys (some that didn’t even reach the roof), 13 bathrooms, 6 kitchens and a séance room (that was once used by Harry Houdini).
Described as being a “woman of independence, drive and courage,” Sarah Winchester died of heart failure in her sleep in September 1922 leaving a will written in 13 sections that was signed 13 times and a safe that contained a lock of her infant daughter’s hair. She was portrayed by Helen Mirren in the 2018 horror film Winchester.
‘The Winchester Mystery House’ was sold five months after its creator’s death and has been open to the public for tours since June 1923.
The vast Winchester Mystery House, 525 South Winchester Boulevard, San Jose, California, CA 95128, United States of America.
“The greatest miser” and “richest woman in America” during the Gilded Age, Hetty Green lived by the rule of “buy cheap and sell dear.” Known for her appalling personal hygiene and ragged dresses, Green inherited £4.5 million or the equivalent of £555 million today ($729 million, €651 million or درهم2.6 billion today) in 1865 from her Quaker whaling tycoon father. By the time of her death, she had increased her worth 3,300% to around £153 million or the equivalent of £18.9 billion today ($24.8 billion, €22.1 billion or درهم91 billion today).
A believer in the approach of “before deciding on an investment, seek out every kind of information about it,” Green married into a wealthy Vermont family in 1867 (but forced her husband to sign a prenup to prevent her own fortune being dissipated). After her cousins then tried to have her indicited for fraud, the couple then left America and moved into the Langham Hotel in London, where both their son and daughter were born. Returning to the US in 1873, the family settled in Bellow Falls, Vermont, but Green – a woman paranoid about being poisoned also – preferred to live in boarding houses and hotels herself.
“Financial genius” Hetty Green “spent her whole life in pursuit of money,” but “bought nothing for herself or her children.” She will forever be remembered as someone so consumed by money that she didn’t even bother to enjoy it.
Quotes attributed to Hetty Green:
“My father taught me never to owe anyone anything, not even a kindness.”
“I believe that woman is quite as capable as man in conducting business affairs… I do not believe woman to be inferior to man, save as she has become so by a mistaken course of training.”
“There is no great secret in fortune making. All you do is buy cheap and sell dear, act with thrift and shrewdness and be persistent… When I see a thing, going cheap because nobody wants it, I buy a lot of it and tuck it away. Then, when the time comes, they have to hunt me up and pay me a good price for my holdings.”
“[On why women don’t get rich] Because they try the wrong way.”
“I buy when things are low and no one wants them. I keep them until they go up, and people are crazy to get them.”
“I believe in getting in at the bottom and out on top. I like to buy railroad stocks or mortgage bonds. When I see a good thing going cheap because nobody wants it, I buy a lot of it and tuck it away.”
“In business generally, don’t close a bargain until you have reflected on it overnight.”
“A good business woman is often sharper than a good business man.”
“When the crash came I had money, and I was one of the very few who really had it.”
“[A bird] in the hand is worth the whole arithmetic in the bush.”
“[On men trying to take advantage of women in business] I have found this particularly so in the courts, where I have been fighting men all my life.’
“American women would be much happier, if they learned the principles of business in girlhood.”
“As for society, I believe in it… I don’t think society means what some rich people would have us believe, I should get very tired of living in one of the great houses in New York, going out all night and sleeping all day. They don’t have any real pleasure. It’s intercourse with people that I like.”
“I like to see everybody get along but the wrongdoers… I believe in discreet charity.”
“”Just because I dress plainly and do not spend a fortune on my gowns, they say I am cranky or insane.”
“I have been blessed in my investments, and that is all… I never worry about things.”
“If we live good lives here, clean lives, and are honest… we need not worry about the next world. I am not worrying.”
The richest self-made woman in the UK paid herself £217 million in 2016 and is said to have a personal fortune of circa £3.17 billion. A former betting shop cashier, Denise Coates purchased the domain Bet365.com in 2000 and has since grown the operation into one of the world’s largest online gambling companies. A Sheffield University graduate and the daughter of the chairman of Stoke City F.C., this incredibly successful business titan is nicknamed ‘The Patron of the Potteries’ for employing a large number of people in Stoke-on-Trent. She lives surprisingly modestly with her husband and five children in a farmhouse in Cheshire.
Reclusive yet charming “leisure entrepreneur” Trevor Hemmings owns over 100 racehorses, lives primarily on the Isle of Man and generously funded the SAFE centre to help victims of sexual violence in Preston, Lancashire.
This “publicity averse” self-made father of four’s Grand National winning horses have included Ballabriggs, Hedgehunter and Many Clouds and other assets in his collection have variously numbered Blackpool Tower and Preston North End Football Club. He also harbours a love for vintage Rolls-Royces and was considered a “surrogate son” by the equally shrewd late businessman and holiday camp owner Sir Fred Pontin (1906 – 2000).
Of his success, in a rare interview in 2015, this cloth capped “earthy” gent modestly remarked:
“In my business life I’ve had to climb the business and financial ladder by doing better next year than I did last year and that’s what life’s about. You have to work longer hours than everybody and you have to be on site seven days a week. Today I’m available seven days a week, people contact me seven days a week, let’s put it like that”.
Pictured above: Trevor Hemmings with Grand National winners Hedgehunter and Ballabriggs at Ballaseyr, Andreas.
An eternal wanderer and worth some £985 million ($1.56 billion), art collector and founder of the Berggruen Holdings, Inc. fund of hedge funds Nicolas Berggruen prefers to live in five-star hotels (more…)
Billionaire Des Moines venture capitalist John Pappajohn was amusingly quoted as saying “Pappa’s in the house” when he dedicated the Pappajohn Business Building at the University of Iowa. (more…)
Pictured above: Trevor Hemmings with Grand National winners Hedgehunter and Ballabriggs at Ballaseyr, Andreas.
