BELLEVUE, WA -- This story originally aired on KING-TVs Evening Magazine in 1991. #Throwback30
"I usually stay at work until eleven or twelve... then go home and read for a while"... that's eleven or twelve PM.
Forbes has officially decreed that Seattle's Bill Gates, with 4.2 billion dollars is the second richest person in the country. So of course we turned to him, hoping to find some secrets of his meteoric success.
As he showed me the main Microsoft campus, Bill confessed that he's a workaholic. He puts in hours even on weekends.
"I only let them schedule meetings on Saturday generally."
Like most of us, Bill says that he escapes the office about once a year, but that's where the similarities end.
"I spend a week a year where I go off and just read people's PHD thesis, and new things that are going on in the field."
Bill believes the prime ingredient of his success was his early fascination with computers.
"You have to understand, when you spend your time thinking intensely about a field from a very young age, which in my case I was 13 or 14 when I started to get involved, that's where you can do great things because your mind has really gotten into it. You understand it."
Another ingredient to his fairy-tale success story is Gates' belief in himself. He admits to buying stocks other than Microsoft, mostly biotech issues, but that's a very small part of his portfolio.
"As a percentage of my assets, 99% of my assets are the stock I own in Microsoft."
Gates does allow himself some creature comforts, he's in the midst of construction a 10 million dollar home, and Gates also squeezes in other haunts as well.
"I've got a house on the lake. I can go water skiing, I can swim, I play tennis... I've got a beach place up at Hood Canal that I can take a sea plane out to from time to time."
As for someone to share his million dollar love nest, yes the second wealthiest person in the country is looking at his schedule and planning to squeeze in a romantic partnership.
"When you take a 10 year time frame it's fair to say, I think there's a good chance, a very good chance, I'd be married by then. By then I'd probably be having a kid or two, sure."
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Appearing in this story: Bill Gates, Penny LeGate
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