ROCKEFELLER, JOHN D(AVISON), III

born March 21, 1906, New York City died July 10, 1978, Mount Pleasant, N.Y., U.S. U.S. philanthropist, eldest of the five sons of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. After graduating from Princeton University (1929), he joined the family's enterprises, becoming, by 1931, trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation, the General Education Board, the Institute for Medical Research, the China Medical Board, and 29 other boards and committees. During World War II he served in the U.S. Navy (194245). Generally thereafter he shunned public life to devote his time and energy to philanthropy and to the acquisition of one of the finest of Oriental art collections (bequeathed at his death to the Asia Society). Among the great cultural gifts he left the nation were the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, the India International Centre in New Delhi, the International House of Japan, and the Asia Society. As eventual chairman of the Rockefeller Foundation, he gave substantial support to international agencies but donated his own funds to found the Population Council (1952), a research centre for family planning. His son, John (Jay) Davison Rockefeller, IV (b. 1937), became prominent in West Virginia politics, serving as governor from 1977.