40. The Sir Francis Drake Estate
Year: 1913
Approx. Amount: $2 million*
Company / Person Involved: Oscar Hartzell
You could say that the Sir Drake scandal was the predecessor for cheats like Wirecard and Wells Fargo. Sir Drake was a rich knight who had a lot of people fake-claiming his ancestry because of his wealth.
The Sir Francis Drake Estate ©MikeVdP / Wikimedia.org
In 1913, thousands of people with the same last name as Drake received a letter from an organization called the “Sir Francis Drake Association.” The letter claimed that Sir Drake’s estate was worth $2.2 billion, but it was held up in court. According to the phony association, all the fake-Drakes had to do was contribute to the “legal fees” of the estate case. In reality, all of it was fake. $2 million was collected under false pretenses, and Iowa farmer Oscar Hartzell was charged with perpetrating the scandal.