Washington (CNN) -- Richard Mellon Scaife, the billionaire publisher and banking heir who financed conservative causes that included attempts to discredit Bill Clinton while he was president, has died. He was 82. Scaife's death on Friday followed his disclosure less than two months ago that he had terminal cancer, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, one of his newspapers. He was heir to the banking, oil and aluminum fortunes of the Mellon family and used his estimated $1.4 billion wealth to underwrite conservative crusades and groups that included the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute. Republican leaders mourned him.
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Scaife was heir to the banking, oil and aluminum fortunes of the Mellon family
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He funded conservative causes with his estimated $1.4 billion fortune
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Scaife funded investigations into President Bill Clinton around the time of his impeachment
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Philanthropy didn't give him as great a sense of accomplishment as did newspapers
Scaife purchased the @placeholder in 1969 and, while he used the paper's editorial pages as a bullhorn for his political views, the newspaper's staff attested to the mogul's love of newspapers.