I dare say there are probably only a few of the readers of this column who have not heard the name John D. Rockefeller. Just the name Rockefeller conjures up images of wealth and power. Everything ...

In 1927, a $5 million donation from the richest man in America—the equivalent of $92 million today—secured the Great Smoky Mountains’ then-tenuous future for protection as a national park. But when ...