Joe Jamail once said that he wanted to teach history but ended up going to the University of Texas School of Law instead. And so began his law career. He started out working on personal injury cases and eventually went on to become the world's wealthiest practicing attorney until his death on December 23, 2015 at age 90. Jamail was famous for winning cases (he helped Pennzoil beat Texaco in an $11 billion lawsuit in 1987) , cursing (when asked what kind of cases he'd been taking in 2009 he said only one out of every 500 - "mostly chickenshit stuff") and enjoying scotch and shrimp. He was also a devoted philanthropist who gifted millions of dollars to the University of Texas and Rice University toward an undergraduate nursing school, a law school and a swimming center.
Many of the 29 billionaires who died over the last year have made an enormous impact in the world they've left behind, whether through philanthropy or by creating opportunities for growth or change within their industry.
Alfred Taubman, a child of the Depression and college dropout, started building shopping complexes in the 1950s after moving to the suburbs and falling in love with the idea of megashops. Over the years, he helped instill the mall into the fabric of America's social life. He later invested in British auction house Sotheby's but was implicated in a price-fixing scandal that landed him in jail for 9 months in 2002; he vigorously denied the charges. Throughout his lifetime, Taubman gave away hundreds of millions of dollars to support education and research, ranging from stem cell research to Detroit-area schools.
French mogul Claude Dauphin left school at age 16 to work in his family's recycling business. Later, he moved to Paris and joined a brokerage firm specializing in trading non-ferrous metals. Within years he would become a leading figure in the realm of oil and metal trading, training under renowned commodities trader Marc Rich and cofounding multinational commodity trader Trafigura with five partners in 1993.
Other billionaires who passed away over the last year include legendary pharmaceutical tycoon and philanthropist Michael Jaharis, who founded Kos Pharmaceuticals. Jaharis, whose parents immigrated to Illinois from the Greek island Lesvos, was also a large supporter of Greek causes, helping create a permanent Greek and Byzantine art exhibit in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.
In Turkey, Mustafa Koc, the eldest son of Mustafa Rahmi Koc, died at age 55 after suffering a heart attack. He served as chairman of the family's conglomerate, Koc Holding from 2003 until his death in January 2016. He is the youngest of the 29 billionaires to have died over the last year.
For more on the legacies of billionaires who passed away this year:
Jassim Al-Kharafi (1940-2015)
Citizenship: Kuwait
Horst Brandstaetter (1933-2015)
Citizenship: Germany
Sidharth Burman (1945-2015)
Citizenship: India
Alfred James Clark (1927-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Claude Dauphin (1951-2015)
Citizenship: France
Fred DeLuca (1947-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Chang Yung Fa (1927-2016)
Citizenship: Taiwan
Susan Hirt Hagen (1935-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Ingeburg Herz (1922-2015)
Citizenship: Germany
Michael Jaharis (1928-2016)
Citizenship: United States
Joe Jamail Jr (1925-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Kirk Kerkorian (1917-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Brijmohan Lall Munjal (1923-2015)
Citizenship: India
Mustafa Vehbi Koc (1960-2016)
Citizenship: Turkey
Jan Kulczyk (1949-2015)
Citizenship: Poland
Maria Ines de Lafuente Lacroze (1944-2015)
Citizenship: Argentina
Christos Lazari (1946-2015)
Citizenship: United Kingdom
Alfred Mann (1925-2016)
Citizenship: United States
Hubert d'Ornano (1941-2015)
Citizenship: France
Robert Piccinini (1942-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Johanna Quandt (1926-2015)
Citizenship: Germany
Richard Rainwater (1944-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Lin Rong San (1939-2015)
Citizenship: Taiwan
Maria Luisa Solari Falabella (1941-2015)
Citizenship: Chile
Ronald Southern (1930-2016)
Citizenship: Canada
Max Michel Suberville (1932-2016)
Citizenship: Mexico
Alfred Taubman (1924-2015)
Citizenship: United States
Klaus Tschira (1940-2015)
Citizenship: Germany
Karl Wlaschek (1917-2015)
Citizenship: Austria