Like Robert Kopstein, whose Optical Cable Corp. went public last year. The stock offering was a hit, and Kopstein, an engineer by trade, is the Roanoke company's biggest shareholder.

Another newcomer to our Virginia 100 is John D. Phillips, who decided to buy historic properties near his former boss, John W. Kluge.

After some close reading, we decided our list should go literary. This gives hope to the struggling authors among us. John Grisham calls Charlottesville home. The former lawyer makes a pretty good hourly rate for his legal thrillers. Richmonder Patricia Cornwell, whose murder mysteries will make great vacation reading when you're done with this magazine, also joins the rolls of Virginia's rich. According to an article in Vanity Fair, she told a friend she's learned so much about murder she "literally could kill someone and get away with it." (Editor's note: Leila Ugincius is the researcher who nominated you for the list.) When it comes to these two new members, maybe the moral is this: Crime does pay.

Gene B. Dixon Jr., owner of Kyanite Mining Corp. in Buckingham County, also joins the list this year. As do John Snow, head of CSX Corp.; Max Pearson, a one-time cabbie who made it big in car dealerships; and the Ivor Massey family, a study in investing for the long haul.

The Virginia 100 lost some distinguished members this year. Among them, Jack Kent Cooke of Middleburg, the flamboyant owner of the Washington Redskins. He died in April at his home in Middleburg at age 84. Details of the disposition of his estate -- valued at more than $800 million -- are still uncertain.

Pamela Churchill Harriman was a longtime alumna, although bad investments knocked her off the 1996 list. The Middleburg resident and U.S. ambassador to France died in February at age 76.Harriman was the widow of W. Averell Harriman, an heir to the Union Pacific railroad fortune.

Further from the spotlight but no less a part of Virginia's landscape was Ann Kirby Kirby, who died last July. She was an heiress to a variety store fortune built by her grandfather. Most people know the stores as the Woolworth Co. The Kirby family remains on the list.

The peaks that put some techno wizards on our list in 1996 gave way to valleys that pulled them down in 1997. We've still got our eye on the stock tables, though. We expect high-tech and telecommunications hatcheries will soon let loose, stocking the commonwealth with an impressive new pool in which to cast.

Other names that hovered near the bottom of The Virginia 100 fell off this year, as the cutoff jumped from $50 million to $60 million.

So why do we do this list, anyway? Readership surveys tell us you like it, for one thing. And that makes sense. It is, for the most part, a compendium of success stories. Businesses that took off in sales and earnings. Fortunes built over time. Wealth handed down through the generations.

Every year we hear from some members of The Virginia 100 who are helpful in letting us know what they've been up to. Then again, some pooh-pooh the project. (OK, those aren't exactly the words they use.)

Our mission is simply to make The Virginia 100 as complete and accurate as possible because tracking wealth gives readers insight into Virginia's business community. But adding up stock values, guessing at private-company price tags and putting dollar figures on used Learjets isn't easy.

That's why we give each net worth estimate a confidence rating: "A" means we believe the figure is accurate; "B" means we think it's in the ballpark; "C" means we want to get closer.

Of course, we could be off. Way off. But there's always next year, and we welcome your input.

Leigh Anne Larance
Senior Editor