How Did Colorado’s Richest Billionaire Make Their Money?

Everyone in Colorado would love to walk around with "a little extra" in their pockets; Colorado's richest person has a lot of "extra." How did they get all their money?

When you are listed on the Forbes 400 list, the 400 richest people in the country, you are someone people should know about. When you top the list for Colorado billionaires, even more so.

How did Colorado's richest billionaire get so rich, anyway?

Phillip Anschutz Tops Forbes 400 List for Colorado

The total riches of the latest Forbess 400 list comes to over $5 trillion; to even get on the list, each person had to have at least $3.3 billion in assets. Colorado's richest person had no worries about that.

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Phillip Anschutz' assets, as of September of 2024, come to a whopping $16.9 billion; I wonder if he's upset that he couldn't come up with another $100,000,000 to make it to $17 billion?

How Did Colorado's Phillip Anschutz Become So Wealthy?

Phillip's father, Fred, was a Kansas businessman that struck it rich in oil. Fred invested those riches into ranches and livestock operations across the west.

In the 1960's as Fred and family were moving their headquarters to Denver from Wichita, Kansas, Phillip (then, 22) bought out his father's Circle A Drilling company in Kansas (with monies you would have to assume came from his father's wealth.)

RELATED: How Did Colorado's Pat Stryker Obtain Her Billionaire Status?

Learning from his father, Phillip invested profits from the oil business into stocks, land and the railways, but it was mainly oil that kicked his fortunes into high gear.

Riches Made From Oil Became More Riches Made From Oil

in 1971, he bought 9 million acres of land along the Utah-Wyoming border that would end up holding a huge deposit of oil. Phillip sold some of that land to Mobil Oil in 1982 for $500 million, which in today's dollars is just over $1.6 billion.

Since 1982, Philip has invested in many things, mostly sports teams and entertainment (AEG Live is "Anschutz Entertainment Group Live")  and venues, including Colorado's Broadmoor Hotel.

He has been very generous with his fortunes, however, with his Anschutz Foundation (not be confused with his sister's foundation) and the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus.