Heir Of Rjr Founder Fights Smoking Patrick Reynolds Sold His Stock, Quit Cigarettes, Battles Industry

Patrick Reynolds has come full circle.

He’s a grandson of tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds. But in 1979, he sold all his stock in the company. Six years later he quit smoking after 15 years and now is an outspoken anti-smoking advocate.

He had to face the ire of disapproving relatives.

He had a heated discussion with his two brothers and a stepbrother. They worried the price of their stock might drop and concerned about the adverse publicity and the family name being discredited.

“The stock rose in price, and I brought credit to the Reynolds’ name,” the founder of the Foundation for a Smokefree America told an audience at Idaho State University Wednesday night. Reynolds was keynote speaker at the Ninth Annual Idaho Conference on Health Care.

Reynolds said 3,000 American teenagers are getting addicted to tobacco each day. About 500 million people or 9 percent of the world’s population will die from cigarettes.

“I’ll do this work the rest of my life,” he said.

His father, a lifetime smoker, died of emphysema when Reynolds was 15.