A Canuck in the top 10, Its almost exciting As spelling Ribieroiiiiiii's name wrong

Chris Sorensen, National Post; with files from ReutersPublished: Friday, March 10, 2006
Canadian media magnate Ken Thomson has reclaimed a top-10 spot on Forbes magazine's list of the world's richest people, rubbing shoulders with wealthy superstars like Microsoft founder Bill Gates, investment guru Warren Buffet and Sweden's Ingvar Kamprad, who founded the Ikea furniture chain.
Mr. Thomson, 82, whose family was estimated to be worth about US$19.6-billion, was ranked 15th on last year's billionaires list and is joined in the top-10 this year by French luxury goods maker Bernard Arnault and Li Ka-Shing, the head of the Hong Kong Conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa. Mr. Thomson held a top-10 spot in the 1990s, but slid out of the upper end of the rankings over the past few years.
The complete list of 793 billionaires, up from last year's list of 691 names thanks to soaring stock, oil and commodities prices, is to be published by the magazine today. "A billion just isn't what it used to be," said Forbes associate editor Luisa Kroll, presenting the 20th annual list at a New York news conference.
The billionaires' combined wealth grew 18% to US$2.6-trillion, according to Forbes.
Unlike some of his upper-crust billionaire peers, Mr. Thomson has preferred to fly under the radar despite accumulating one of the most remarkable fortunes in Canadian history through Thomson Corp., a media and information conglomerate with a market value of $27.7-billion, and a family holding company that once held a majority interest in the Hudson's Bay Co., formerly Canada's oldest retailer.
"The lowest profile is the very best to have," Mr. Thomson once told Peter C. Newman in a 1991 article for Maclean's magazine.
Indeed, while Microsoft's Mr. Gates (No. 1 on the Forbes list for the past 12 consecutive years) and his wife are using their vast wealth to launch a much-talked about crusade to defeat malaria in Africa, and while Berkshire Hathaway's Mr. Buffet's (No. 2) investment tips annually draw thousands to Omaha, Neb., Mr. Thomson has preferred to stay far from the spotlight's glare and closer to things that bring him true pleasure -- including his massive art collection.
"My collection is very personal," he told the Financial Post Moneywise Magazine in 1987. "All my objets d'art have memories that go with them and they all have something that appealed to me in the first place, or I wouldn't have bought them."
Included among the 3,000-odd works is Massacre of the Innocents, a long-lost masterpiece by Rubens that Mr. Thomson bought for US$77-million, according to Forbes.
In 2002, Mr. Thomson donated an estimated $300-million worth of paintings to the Art Gallery of Ontario and then pledged $50-million to the art gallery the following year to help pay for an expansion project.
The Thomson family's media empire was founded in the early 1930s when Mr. Thomson's father, Roy, bought two radio stations in Northern Ontario. He then purchased the Timmins Daily Press newspaper in 1934.
By the time he died, Roy Thomson, a barber's son, carried the British title Lord Thomson of Fleet and presided over a prestigious collection of newspapers and other media properties that included such jewels as the Times of London.