Low Profile
Lukas has proved adept at keeping a low profile. He grew up in National City in San Diego County and Jackson, Wyoming.
"They were just one of the neighbors, just one of the very rich neighbors," said Ron Morrison, mayor of National City, who was a regular visitor to the area where the family lived from 1986 to 2005.
As a young child, Lukas was diagnosed with cancer. His mother attributes his survival to an organic food diet, according to an interview she gave to the San Diego Union- Tribune in 2008.
Lukas graduated with a bachelor’s degree in environmentally sustainable business from Colorado College, according to a letter from his high school. His college directory lists his graduation year as 2010 and his work history as an unspecified position at the Walton Family Foundation. He has worked for venture capital company True North Venture Partners, according to local press coverage of the commencement speech he gave at his high school in 2011.
Unsealed Documents
The fate of his father John’s stake was unknown ever since a judge in Teton County, Wyoming, sealed the estate in September 2005 at the request of the family. Walton had died three months before, at age 58, when the ultra-light aircraft he was piloting crashed shortly after taking off from Jackson Hole Airport.
The documents reveal the painstaking seven-year-long legal undertaking to distribute the estate and underline the family’s extensive use of trust structures to minimize the amount of tax they pay.
His father’s will directed that Lukas be given the right to vote the estate’s general and limited partner units in Walton Enterprises. That could make him one of the first of the family’s third generation to be a voting shareholder in the controlling entity, if he decides to exercise his voting power.
Family Control