Bryn Mawr Is Home To 2 Of PA's Richest Residents

BRYN MAWR, PA – Did you know two of the richest Pennsylvania residents live right here in Bryn Mawr?

That's right, according to the Forbes 400 list, John Middleton and Michael Rubin, Pennsylvania's third and fourth richest residents respectively, call Bryn Mawr home.

According to Forbes Middleton's net worth is $3 billion. Forbes also reports Middleton is the country's 264th richest.

Rubin's net worth is just shy of Middleton's at $2.9 billion, according to Forbes. He is also listed as the 278th richest person in the United States.

Middleton, 62, made his fortune by selling his family-owned, Philadelphia-based tobacco business to the Phillip Morris parent company, Altria, in 2007 for $2.9 billion. The company, John Middleton Inc., was formed in the mid 1800s and made products such as Black and Mild cigars.

He is also the primary stakeholder in the Philadelphia Phillies, with 48 percent of the team under his ownership.

Rubin, 45, earned his fortune after dropping out of Villanova University and forming GSI Commerce, which he subsequently sold to eBay for a sizeable $2.4 billion in 2011, according to Forbes.

He has since gone on to found Kynetic, the holding company for e-commerce retailers Fanatics, Rue La La and ShopRunner.

Rubin is also a sports team owner, maintaining shares of the Philadelphia 76ers and the New Jersey Devils.

Just five Pennsylvanians made the list, all of whom are local to the greater Philadelphia area.

Other locals who are on the Forbes 400 List are:

• Victoria Mars, of Newtown Square, heir and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Mars Inc. candy and pet food company. She is worth $6.3 billion.
• Mary Alice Dorrance Malone, of Coatesville, is the largest shareholder of the Campbell Soup Company. She is worth $3.3 billion.
• Jeffrey Lurie, of Wynnewood, is the owner of the Philadelphia Eagles. He is worth $2 billion.

Not surprisingly, Bill Gates leads the pack as the richest American in 2017. (He's been number one for 24 consecutive years.)

Gates is followed closely by another Seattle-area billionaire, Jeff Bezos.

Forbes noted that the price of admission to the list jumped nearly 18 percent to $2 billion. There were 26 billionaires on the 2016 list who fell off, and 22 newcomers made the list for the first time. One of the notable names that fell of the list is Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank.

To come up with the rankings of the 400 richest Americans, Forbes journalists started with a list of about 600 people considered strong candidates. Forbes looked at public records, news stories and when possible interviewed the candidates in person or via phone. All types of assets were taken into account, and Forbes also factored in debt.

One of the notable losers on the list was President Donald Trump, Forbes says. According to Forbes, Trump’s fortune fell $600 million to $3.1 billion. Trump’s Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross fell off the list altogether when he filed disclosure forms showing he had a net worth of less than $1 billion.

According to Forbes, these are the 10 richest Americans in 2017:

Bill Gates, net worth $89 billion, Microsoft (1)
Jeff Bezos, net worth $81.5 billion, Amazon (2)
Warren Buffett, net worth $78 billion, Berkshire Hathaway (3)
Mark Zuckerberg, net worth $71 billion, Facebook (4)
Larry Ellison, net worth $59 billion, software (5)
Charles Koch, net worth $48.5 billion, diversified (6)
David Koch, net worth $48.5 billion, diversified (6)
Michael Bloomberg, net worth $46.8 billion, Bloomberg LP (8)
Larry Page, net worth $44.6 billion, Google (9)
Sergey Brin, net worth $43.4 billion, Google (10)

>>> Click here to see the full list.

With reporting from Kara Seymour

Image via Shutterstock