J. Watson Webb Jr.(1916-2000)

American film editor and scion of two of America's most prominent and wealthy industrialist families. His mother, Electra Havemeyer Webb, was the daughter of sugar baron Henry Havemeyer, and his father, J. Watson Webb, was the great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Raised in immense wealth and educated at Yale University, Webb chose a life quite removed from that of his family. In 1940, he obtained a job as an assistant film cutter at Twentieth Century Fox. He showed great talent and was promoted to film editor, eventually becoming chief editor for the studio. He retired at 36 and devoted himself to artistic patronage and charitable works. He took over the Shelburne Museum, which his mother had founded, and was largely responsible for the immense collection of American art and arcania it holds. He resigned from the Museum in anger over its decision to auction off several million dollars worth of art. He took a great interest in the Boys Republic, a school for troubled youngsters in Chino Hills, California (where one famous "student" was Steve McQueen), and left $3.4 million dollars to the school upon his death. (He left nothing to the Shelburne Museum.) He died in Los Angeles in 2000.