Ruth Lilly, Eli Lilly Heiress, Prozac Beneficiary Dies At 94
Ruth Lilly, 94, died on Wednesday. She was the last surviving great-grandchild of Col. Eli Lilly, the founder of the pharmaceutical giant, and in 2002 her fortune was valued at $800 million to $1 billion, although she didn’t have direct control of her estate. She gave away much of that before she died, including $200 million to the foundation that publishes Poetry magazine, which had long rejected Lilly’s verse.
Lilly reportedly suffered from depression much of her life and, ironically, took Prozac, which apparently helped her greatly.
“Prozac, the Lilly company’s most successful drug in decades, came on the market in 1988. Ms. Lilly began taking the green-and-white pills, and her outlook brightened. ‘That thing made a world of difference,’ her physician Jack Hall told the Star in 2002. ‘Prozac really helped her–it changed her life.’”
No cause of death was given.
Related posts:
Posted in Furious Seasons