AHC: H.P. Lovecraft,richest man in the world

I know this is kind of ASB but lets see if anyone up for it can you turn Howard Phillips Lovecraft antisocial horror writer and heir to a failing mining company into the richest man in the world .
 
Earlier recognition would help. Lovecraft was an introvert who failed to promote himself. At best, I could see some strong arm management figure, the likes of which are pop culture horror stories (Tom Parker, Allen Klein), taking over his life and image and making him money but at the expense of how much money he could actually make.
 
I think it's pretty unprecedented for an entertainment figure, much less a mere writer, to be among even the top ten richest people in the world. Stephen King, a writer who has had his work adapted into(usually quite lucrative) Hollywood films and TV shows close to a hundred times, isn't, as far as I know, ever included on lists of the World's Richest.

I think you'd need Lovecraft to become some sort of Walt Disney-type figure, with some of his characters taking on a highly iconic status, and being reproduced around the world in books, cartoons, movies, t-shirts, diapers etc, for this to work. And, even then, I don't think I've ever heard Uncle Walt listed among the world's richest people, unless the list is confined to entertainers.
 

cpip

Gone Fishin'
How about if Grandpa Whipple doesn't have the stroke in 1904? Instead he lives another 6, 8 years, and is a steadying influence in young Howard's life, managing to get him out of the house and into the family business? H.P.'s a bit older then, takes a hand in the management of his grandfather's estate, and ends up involved in the dam-building of the 20s and 30s, so instead, into the 30s and 40s, H.P. is a prominent engineer and businessman? You also have to butterfly away his stomach cancer, perhaps, or at least make it more treatable, which is probably possible if he's not an impoverished writer.
 
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