Robert D. Ziff
businessperson
Robert D. Ziff (born 1967) is an American billionaire, and the middle son of publishing magnate William Bernard Ziff Jr. and grandson of William Bernard Ziff Sr. He and his two brothers inherited the family fortune in 1994.
Early life and education
Robert was born in 1967. His mother was Barbara Ingrid Beitz, an ethnic German whose parents were declared as "Righteous among the Nations" for providing refuge and risking their lives to save Jews during World War II. His father was the Jewish American media magnate William Ziff Jr. (d. 2006), who had built the Ziff-Davis magazine empire founded by William Bernard Ziff Sr. that included titles such as Popular Aviation, PC Magazine, and Car and Driver.
Ziff studied undergraduate electrical and computer engineering at Harvard University, graduating magna cum laude. In 1992, he graduated first in his class from Cornell Law School and was editor of the Cornell Law Review.
“Robert D. Ziff” enters the record as businessperson. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Robert, Ziff and businessperson can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Robert D. Ziff” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Robert, Ziff and businessperson provides the most credible route into that argument.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7343351. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1967, 1994, 2006 and 1992.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Robert D. Ziff”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Robert D. Ziff primary sources, Robert D. Ziff archive and Robert research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Robert D. Ziff”?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Robert D. Ziff” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.