J. Howard Marshall

In 1952, Marshall co-founded Great Northern Oil, which, in 1955, built an oil refinery in Rosemount, Minnesota that could refine heavy, sour Canadian crude oil.[8] In 1959, Fred Koch acquired a 35% interest in Great Northern Oil for $5 million. Union Oil acquired a majority interest in Great Northern and attempted to take over the company, but Marshall and Koch, who wanted to keep their assets in private hands, blocked the takeover. In 1969, after buying out Union Oil, Charles Koch, who shared a similar business philosophy with Marshall, swapped a stake in Koch Industries for the rest of Marshall's shares in Great Northern Oil.[9]

Marshall married Eleanor Pierce in 1931 and divorced in 1961. They had two sons together: J. Howard Marshall III (born February 6, 1936) and E. Pierce Marshall (January 12, 1939 – June 20, 2006). His second marriage, to Bettye Bohannon, lasted from 1961 until her death from Alzheimer's disease in 1991.

In 1982, he met "Lady" Diane Walker at a strip club and offered to marry her if his wife Betty, who had Alzheimer's disease, were to die. Over several years, Marshall gave Walker $15 million worth of jewelry and other gifts. Walker died in 1991 at age 51 due to complications from facelift surgery. The gifts became subject to scrutiny by the Internal Revenue Service since gift taxes were not paid; Marshall claimed that the gifts were instead "consulting fees".

In 1994, at the age of 89, he married 26-year-old model Anna Nicole Smith. Their marriage lasted until his death 14 months later.

In 1980, when Marshall's eldest son, J. Howard Marshall III, sided with Bill Koch, Frederick R. Koch and other collateral family members in dispute with Charles Koch and David H. Koch over making Koch Industries a public company and paying dividends, Marshall purchased back company stock from his son, given previously as a gift, for $8 million, considered to be a premium price, and removed the eldest son from his will and testament. Conversely, during the same dispute, his youngest son E. Pierce Marshall sided with his father, and that son received substantially all of Marshall's estate, valued at $1.6 billion at the time of his death.

On August 4, 1995, Marshall died of pneumonia at age 90 in Houston, Texas.[10] Following Marshall's death, Anna Nicole Smith (who died on February 8, 2007) became involved in a court battle with her former stepson, E. Pierce Marshall (who died on June 20, 2006). J. Howard's will and trust did not include Anna Nicole or J. Howard's other son, J. Howard Marshall III. Anna Nicole and J. Howard III both sought to overturn the will and trust. In 2001, they both lost their cases during a six-month Texas state court jury trial.[11]

During the probate proceedings, Smith declared bankruptcy in California and was awarded $474 million as a sanction for E. Pierce Marshall’s alleged misconduct in discovery.[12] In 2002, the bankruptcy judgment was vacated and Smith’s award was reduced to $88 million in a United States district court in California.[13] In December 2004, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit vacated the District Court decision under the probate exception, ruling that the federal courts lacked subject matter jurisdiction over state probate matters. The Ninth Circuit decision also affirmed the primacy of Texas Probate decision which determined that no misconduct had taken place and that Smith was not one of J. Howard Marshall's heirs.[14] However, on May 1, 2006, the Supreme Court of the United States in Marshall v. Marshall reversed the Ninth Circuit's decision regarding the probate exception, allowing Smith another opportunity to pursue her claims in federal court. The case was remanded to the Ninth Circuit for adjudication of the remaining appellate issues.[15][16] On June 25, 2009, the same three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit heard oral arguments on the remaining appellate issues.[17] On March 19, 2010, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued its second opinion on remand, finding in favor of E. Pierce Marshall, that the California Bankruptcy Court did not have jurisdiction and the California Federal District Court was precluded from reviewing matters already decided in the Texas Probate Court.[18]

On September 28, 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court again agreed to hear the case.[19] On June 23, 2011, the United States Supreme court decided the case in a 5–4 decision in favor of the Marshall family (now styled Stern v. Marshall 10-179). The majority of the Court decided Congress cannot constitutionally authorize non-Article III bankruptcy judges final order jurisdiction on state law based counterclaims to proofs of claim which are not necessary to resolve the claim itself.[20]

Marshall's eldest son, J. Howard Marshall III, lost his case in Texas probate court and also lost a counterclaim against him for fraud with malice. The jury originally awarded E. Pierce Marshall $35 million in damages but the probate court reduced that amount to $10 million. J. Howard Marshall III then filed for bankruptcy in California and was discharged by the same bankruptcy judge that had administered Smith's bankruptcy. This decision was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

In 1976, Marshall pledged $4 million to his alma mater, Haverford College. However, by the time of his death in 1995, Marshall had only contributed $2 million. Haverford sued his estate in a Houston probate court; in April 2003, a jury found that Haverford had not been injured because it had not relied on Marshall's pledges.[21]