Here are a few of the powerful wives out there!
9 - Joanne Harrison Joanne Harrison, aka Pawn Mom,
was more involved with the business side of things than fans of Pawn Stars may be aware.
She recently sued her son in a dispute over family assets and their Las Vegas business.
At 81, she apparently isn't too old to try and use the law to get what she thinks is hers.
The lawsuit, which is about an alleged breach of contract, says that while she
was in the hospital during 2000 and 2001, Rick Harrison had her sign over her 51% ownership
interest in the pawnshop. This was years before the business became the setting for the hit
History Channel reality show. If the Harrison's never became celebrities,
this whole dispute may have never happened. But when you have your own show, a lot more money
gets involved than when you're just selling random stuff people found in their attic.
When Richard Harrison Sr., aka "The Old Man," passed away in 2018, Joanne inherited his 49%
stake in the shop. Joanne has also alleged that she's owed half a million dollars
in cash and silver that she believes her husband saved before his passing.
8 - Griselda Blanco Griselda, aka La Madrina, aka Black
Widow, aka the Queen of Narco-Trafficking, was a Colombian drug lord. She pioneered the selling of
narcotics in Miami, supplying Americans from the heyday of the 1980s up through the early 2000s.
Police estimated that Blanco was responsible for up to 200 passings while alive and in charge of
a high volume of narco traffic. At the height of her power, she was most likely one of the
richest women in the world, although nobody really knows for sure exactly how much money she had.
She was certainly one of the most dangerous women in the world and one of the most influential
narcos. Blanco was the first female criminal to have a net worth of over a billion dollars.
Blanco and her second husband, Bravo, moved to the US with fake passports and settled down in
New York. They started their lives as narco entrepreneurs north of the border. In 1975
Blanco was indicted on federal charges for trafficking. Still, she managed to escape
back to Colombia before getting arrested. She moved right back to America and lived in Miami.
Blanco created an intensely competitive atmosphere in Miami. Blanco was known for
her ruthlessness even amongst other dealers, and other kingpins were constantly trying
to take her out. Her own husband tried to get rid of her in a nightclub parking lot,
but she managed to get the jump on him and his six bodyguards in the ensuing firefight.
In 2012, someone finally put a successful hit out on the 69-year-old Blanco. While she
was at a butcher shop, someone who's never been identified pulled up on a motorcycle,
walked in, took her out, and then disappeared. She had so many enemies that there's simply no
way of knowing who actually did it. Her son, Michael Corleone Blanco,
runs a clothing brand named Puro Blanco. Yes, that's his real name.
7 - Yang Huiyan Yang Huiyan is a Chinese-born businesswoman and
property developer. She's the majority shareholder of Country Garden Holdings, a stake she inherited
from her father, Yang Guoqiang, in 2007. Country Garden Holdings is one of China's most prominent
real estate companies and has built over 200 townships. With a net worth of nearly 21 billion
dollars, she’s the richest woman in China and the 11th richest person in the country overall.
Country Garden's initial offering raised 1.6 billion dollars. For reference,
Google raised that much back in 2004. That should be a good indication that
this is a seriously influential company. Yang is the vice-chairman of the board's
governance committee and raised 410 million selling new shares in 2014.
Yang graduated from Ohio State University in 2003 with a Bachelor of Arts/Science.
She's been involved in some rich-person controversies, most likely related to tax
avoidance. She's a citizen of Cyprus, but China technically doesn't recognize dual nationality.
It's also worth noting that Country Garden Holdings is incorporated in the Cayman Islands.
6 - Susanne Klatten
Susanne Klatten, whose full, much more German name is Susanne Hanna Ursula Klatten,
is a German billionaire heiress. She's the daughter of Herbert Quandt, who was known for
saving BMW from bankruptcy and using forced labor in his factories during World War II.
Klatten's net worth is estimated to be somewhere around 23 billion dollars, making
her the richest woman in Germany and the 65th richest person in the entire world,
according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
When her father died, she inherited his 50.1% stake in the pharmaceutical and chemicals
manufacturer Altana. She's on the company's supervisory board and helped transform it into
the massive corporation it is today. Altana is in the German DAX list of the top 30 companies.
In 2009, Klatten bought most of the shares she didn't already own,
consolidating her power. She also owns 19% of BMW and sits on the board with her brother.
Klatten generally keeps a low profile, but she couldn't stay out of the spotlight entirely when
she got blackmailed in 2007. A man named Helg Sgarbi threatened to release a video of them
having an affair. Helg ran similar blackmail schemes against ultra-wealthy women before,
and this time he ended up going to jail for six years.
5 - Ruth, Eunice, and Cindi Bigelow Unbeknownst to most people,
Bigelow Tea Company is run by three female powerhouses. Bigelow is best known as the
creator of Constant Comment, their most popular flavor. It was invented by Ruth
Bigelow back in the 1940s and given that name because all her friends couldn't stop
talking about how good it was. She was the founder of Bigelow Tea.
Before becoming the tea queen of America,
Ruth was an interior designer until the Great Depression hit in the 1940s. At 49-years-old,
Ruth brewed and sold her own specialty tea to make ends meet. Her husband, David, helped bring
Bigelow to specialty tea shops until she passed away in 1966. He followed soon after in 1970.
Years later, their son David Jr. and his wife Eunice Bigelow
oversaw the explosion of the tea market. They started selling way more kinds of tea than just
Constant Comment. Bigelow rose to become the number one specialty tea company in America.
Currently, the company is run by Cindi Bigelow, the third-generation president,
and CEO. She spent 20 years working at the company her grandmother Ruth founded before
eventually being named CEO. Under her watch, Bigelow has entered the modern era where
you can buy tea on the internet, something which would have probably blown Ruth's mind.
4 - Abigail Johnson Abigail is the chair,
CEO, and President of Fidelity Investments. Her grandfather, Edward C. Johnson the 2nd, founded
the company in 1946. She definitely falls into the category of "old money."
She officially became the CEO in 2016, taking complete control of Fidelity and its
45,000 employees scattered worldwide. Johnson is also worth 22 billion dollars,
making her one of the wealthiest women in the world. She was ranked number 6 on Forbes'
2021 list of powerful women, and in 2020 she was the wealthiest person in Massachusetts.
Johnson is considered one of the most powerful women in the entire finance world.
Johnson attended prestigious schools since birth. She went to a private school called Buckingham
Browne in Cambridge and then graduated from Hobart and William Smith college.
She majored in art history, which would have nothing to do with her later career.
Later she obtained an MBA from Harvard Business School, which would have a lot
to do with her later career as the inheritor of Fidelity Investments. (CTA to subscribe)
3 - Jacqueline Mars Jacqueline Mars is an
heiress of the Mars family, best known as the founder of Mars, Incorporated,
maker of Mars bars. They also make Snickers, M&Ms, Skittles, Life Savers, and just about
every other candy you'll see by the cashier at the store. Jacqueline Mars was ranked by Bloomberg
Billionaires Index as the 48th richest person in the world, with a net worth of 43 billion dollars.
She went to an elite boarding school in New England and then graduated from Bryn Mawr,
a women's college. She majored in anthropology, either because she was legitimately interested in
anthropology or, because she was so rich, she knew she could just major in whatever she wanted to.
Her shares of Mars Incorporated were estimated by Forbes to be worth 23.5
billion dollars. She's the 18th richest American and the 34th richest person
in the world. She wasn't just an heiress; she did have an actual job at the company
at one point. She worked for Mars as Food Product Group President.
In 2013, Mars was in a car accident on Route 50 near her home in The Plains in Northern Virginia.
Her car crossed the highway center line and hit a Chrysler minivan that had 6 people inside.
One of those people passed at the scene. Another was pregnant and ended up losing
the baby because of the accident. Mars was charged with reckless driving and later told
a witness that she had fallen asleep at the wheel. She pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor
charge of reckless driving.(2nd CTA to subscribe at placement of thumb)
2 - Emma Coronel Aispuro
Aispuro is best known as the wife of El Chapo. He was the most wanted man in Mexico, at least
he was until he was imprisoned for life. His wife Emma was a lot more involved than people thought.
Emma was born near San Francisco. Interestingly enough, her father was both a cattle rancher and
a deputy sanctioned by the Treasury Department under the Foreign Narcotics designation.
So she probably should have known better than to marry El Chapo.
She met El Chapo when she entered the 2007 Coffee and Guava Festival beauty pageant. By then,
she was a well-known beauty queen, and El Chapo traveled there to meet her at
a party she was throwing. Apparently, they decided to get married that day.
Emma was arrested in 2021 for trafficking. Her marriage led to her getting pretty involved in
the El Chapo family business. She even helped her husband escape from a Mexican prison in 2015
and 2016. Some people think she may have turned herself in on purpose
as part of a plan to hopefully get a lenient sentence and not end up
like her husband. If that was her goal, it worked since she only got a 3-year sentence.
Emma, however, was the fourth in a long line of Mrs. El Chapos. His first wife,
Alejandrina María Salazar Hernández, was related to his cartel co-leader,
Hector. They had three children who, undoubtedly, played some role in the family business. In 2012,
US Marshals sanctioned Alejandria and her youngest son, Jesus. While still married
to Alejandria, El Chapo fell in love with and married a bank clerk named Estela Pena.
In the mid-80s, El Chapo married his third wife,
​​Griselda Guadalupe López, and had four children. One lost his life in
a gang-related incident, and another was blacklisted for laundering cartel money.
1 - Françoise Bettencourt Meyers According to Forbes, Francoise
Bettencourt Meyers is the richest woman in the entire world, with an estimated fortune of
75.3 billion dollars. She’s the granddaughter of Eugene Schueller, the founder of L'Oreal.
Meyers shot way up the billionaire ranks when her mother died in 2017,
and the inheritance tripled her wealth overnight. Meyers has so much money that
she's actually 12 billion dollars richer than the second richest woman in the world, Alice Walton.
Meyers had a strict Catholic upbringing, and she has written several commentaries on the Bible.
However, she married Jean-Pierre Meyers, the grandson of a rabbi who died at Auschwitz, and
raised her own children as Jewish. The marriage was controversial because her grandfather went
on trial for collaborating with the Nazis. For the most part, she has stayed out of the public eye.
When the Notre-Dame de Paris was severely damaged in a fire, she donated 226 million to help repair
it. She’s the current chair-woman of L’Oreal, but also likes writing and playing the piano.
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