From modest beginnings in Queens, New York, Dave Rose became the first director of the Alaska Permanent Fund, playing a crucial role in managing the multibillion-dollar savings account created by voters after discovery of oil at Prudhoe Bay. Rose loved to tell stories. His childhood recollections are reminiscent of a Neil Simon play--warm and witty tales of an irrepressible city boy. With a partner, he starts the first kosher-style deli in Alaska. But that's getting ahead of the story. The Army takes Rose and his bride, Fran, to postwar Anchorage. There, he is elected to office, but a political brawl over his principled stand on civil rights crushes a promising political career. Rose's insider account of the formative days of the permanent fund, as told to award-winning journalist and author Charles Wohlforth, tells of the inner workings of a unique institution that converts earnings from investment of oil wealth into cash payments for Alaskans.