Gianni Agnelli

Italian industrialist, the head of Fiat since 1966, an auto empire established by grandfather, Giovanni. His father, Edoardo, died in an airplane accident in 1935 and his mother, Virginia, died in an auto accident in November 1945. The Agnelli family controls one-quarter of the country's stock market and touches virtually every aspect of Italian life, from cars and food to clothes and credit cards. Agnelli's personal net worth is put at $1.7 billion. After Army service 1941-1943, he played with the jet-set for a few years before taking his place as Vice-President of Italy's largest private business, 300,000 employees in more than one thousand companies. He is an exquisitely tailored and handsome modern Caesar and workaholic. He has always made his own rules, the perfect Renaissance man, controlling the $50 billion Fiat empire while racing around the world as the daredevil playboy of la dolce vita. For many years he had famous girlfriends too numerous to count, including Anita Ekberg and Hedy Lamarr along with princesses, fashion models and socialites. He takes a conveniently old-fashioned view of upper-class marriage, Italian style: the steadfast wife, multiple mistresses, and never a word of divorce. He was always a devoted husband to Marella, treasuring her intelligence and class, though he wears a public mask of undemonstrative impassivity. Married to a ravishingly elegant wife, Marella, in 1953, he had two children; son Edoardo born in New York 6/11/1954 and daughter Margharita born in Luzanne 10/26/1955. They have seven exquisitely decorated homes in Italy, America and Switzerland, a vast art collection, fleets of cars, two yachts, two company helicopters and seven company planes. His home at Turin is a 45-room rococo villa with a commanding view of the Alps. "Everything in life is on loan," he says. Agnelli has a pronounced limp, the result of an auto accident that shattered his right leg in seven places, rendering it virtually useless. He nonetheless manages to drive and ski, and refuses to use a cane. He keeps trim with a Spartan diet. A guest remarked that dinner at his house was elegant - but sparse. Agnelli regrets that his only son, Edoardo, is not a businessman. Edoardo was arrested in 1990 for heroin possession. In that year, the Fiat profits plummeted to half that of the prior year. Hotshot young entrepreneurs were rising in the ranks, jockeying to fill the vacuum that Agnelli will leave. When he retires in 1996, at 75, his successor as Fiat chairman is his brother Umberto, 13 years his junior. Gianni was the second born of seven, and the first son of Eduardo, and 14 when his dad was killed in a freak accident. His grandfather, Giovanni, kept a tight reign and monitored his progress, though his mom gave the kids much more freedom. When she took a lover, Giovanni sued for custody, but she fought valiantly and kept her kids with her. The Senator introduced Gianni to business by taking him on factory tours and sending him on a trip to American when the boy was 18 to see the Ford assembly line at Detroit. Gianni followed the family tradition of military school, but he studied law instead of engineering as his grandfather wished. When WW II broke out he went to the Russian front where he was wounded twice and nearly lost a finger to frostbite. In North Africa, he was wounded once more, this time in an argument with a German soldier over a woman. After being shot in the arm, he finished his drink and walked out. In September 1943, he was in an auto accident that cracked his right ankle in half. In late 1945, Gianni's mother and grandfather died three weeks apart. At 24, he became the family patriarch. Fortunately, Giovanni had assigned a loyal and cunning lieutenant, Vittorio Valletta, to run Fiat until Gianni was ready. Gianni bought a 28 room villa in the South of France and began to explore all the dimensions of partying, with Hollywood tycoons and European aristocracy, roaring down to the beach, sailing on his yacht, casino gambling and carousing in nightclubs, dinners for 30. He returned frequently to Turin to confer with Valletta. He spent ten years burning the proverbial candle, working days and playing nights. He and Pamela Harriman Churchill lived together for a few years and she proved a steadying companion, steering him toward men who were politically well connected and advantageous. They seemed destined to marry until a night in August 1952 when she came upon him romancing a young brunette. She was furious and walked out on him. Agitated, he drove down the hill at Monte Carlo and missed a turn. He careened into a truck, breaking his jaw and smashing his leg. No one else was hurt. When his leg became gangrenous, he violently opposed amputation, but had to spend nine months in bed. His sisters oversaw his care, allowing their good friend Princess Marella Caraciolo di Castagneto to visit. Marella had met Gianni after the war and pronounced him "magnificent." She had gone on to New York to work as a photographic assistant and a model, returning to Rome to pursue photography. Gianni was 32 and Marella 27 when they married near Strasbourg, France in November 1953. "The new Fiat" was born six months later. Despite the difficulties, they have continued an adoring exchange, seeking each other's company daily. Gianni did not take over Fiat until he was 45, in 1966. After wringing the most out of pleasure, he decided to savor power. Fiat prospered in the postwar years. In the '70s, the oil crisis and labor unrest threw Italian industry into turmoil. Gianni and Umberto diversified at that time into other profitable ventures. Made more cautious by a triple by-pass surgery, in 1980 Agnelli gave up day-to-day management of Fiat, appointing Cesare Romiti as president. As he neared his 70s, he began to spend more time in art galleries than nightclubs, finding pleasure on a mountain or in a sailboat. He died on the morning of January 24, 2003 at age 82 Link to Wikipedia biography