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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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042489
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04248900.011
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1990-09-17
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BUSINESS, Page 52Tobacco Road's Dirty AshtraysAn heir to a cigarette fortune portrays a grim family legacy
For Patrick Reynolds, 40, tobacco is the root of a small
fortune and the object of a zealous crusade. A grandson of R.J.
Reynolds, founder of the giant tobacco company, Reynolds enjoyed
a privileged prep-school upbringing in Connecticut and Florida. But
in the five years since he stubbed out his last cigarette, the
sometime TV-and-film actor has become a militant antismoker. Now
Reynolds has co-written, with author Tom Shachtman, The Gilded Leaf
(Little, Brown; $19.95), a moralistic tale about a fortune built
on tobacco and dissipated by reckless heirs. Says Reynolds: "The
hand that fed me is the tobacco industry, and that same hand has
killed millions of people."
Reynolds recounts that his grandfather was hesitant to cater
to the budding cigarette craze in 1911 because he feared that the
smoke from the paper wrappers might be harmful. But when scientific
tests seemed to prove otherwise, Reynolds made the fateful decision
to launch a new brand, Camel.
The resulting wealth, says Reynolds, ignited the flames of
family ruin. Despite the author's wooden narration, he portrays a
cast of heirs straight out of Dynasty: wastrels, alcoholics and
eccentrics who became entangled in sordid divorces and murky
crimes. Patrick's uncle Smith Reynolds, a daredevil pilot, died of
a gunshot wound and was deemed a suicide. The author suggests that
his uncle's second wife actually did the deed. Patrick Reynolds
rarely saw his father, R.J. (Dick) Reynolds Jr., a chain smoker and
heavy drinker who married four times and died at 58 of emphysema.
No family member in 40 years has held a major job in the
company, which merged with Nabisco in 1985. The last ties were cut
in January, when heirs sold their stock to Kohlberg Kravis Roberts,
the investment firm that bought RJR Nabisco for $25 billion. In his
own small way, Patrick Reynolds has remained an annoyance to
relatives and cigarette makers alike. If his book is successful,
he says, he will donate a substantial portion of the profits to a
lobbying group he is forming, the Foundation for a Smoke-Free
America.