Against a richly detailed backdrop of history, the story of this unique American family unfolds. It begins with John D. Rockefeller Sr., who amassed a fortune amid the muck and disorder of the Pennsylvania oil fields and left his son to deal with the public outcry. It follows Rockefeller Jr. as he built the charities and foundations that made the name a public institution. And it tracks the lives of the five Rockefeller brothers. Here then is Laurance, clever and charming as a youth, burned out and cynical by middle age; Winthrop, the shy, awkward, black sheep who finally made a mark for himself in the eyes of everyone but his family; JDR3, introverted and anxious even after years of proving himself; David, a man on the move who took the nation's front-ranking bank and made it number three; and Nelson, ambitious, aggressive, the brother who broke the unwritten family code.
