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Anderson Cooper

Anderson Cooper won't get mom's millions

Olivia Barker
USA TODAY
Gloria Vanderbilt and Anderson Cooper attend the launch party for "The World Of Gloria Vanderbilt" at the Ralph Lauren Women's Boutique on November 4, 2010 in New York City

The Silver Fox is doing just fine on his own, thankyouverymuch.

So he's far from miffed that his famous heiress mom, Gloria Vanderbilt, has told him he doesn't stand to inherit her fortune. In fact, he sounds relieved.

"My mom's made clear to me that there's no trust fund," Anderson Cooper, 46, told Howard Stern on his radio show Monday. "There's none of that."

The 90-year-old Vanderbilt, of course, is a scion of those railroad-building Vanderbilts — and also amassed her own sizable pot of money by pioneering designer jeans and perfume in the '80s.

Regardless of Mom's decision, "I don't believe in inheriting money," Cooper said. "I think it's an initiative sucker. I think it's a curse."

"Who has inherited a lot of money that has gone on to do things in their own life? From the time I was growing up, if I felt that there was some pot of gold waiting for me, I don't know that I would've been so motivated."

Forget the family name that bedecks buildings and roads throughout his native New York and beyond: Cooper clings far more tightly to his other roots. "My dad (Wyatt Emory Cooper) grew up really poor in Mississippi ... I paid attention to that because I thought that's a healthier thing to pay attention to than, like, some statue of a great-great-great-grandfather who has no connection to my life."

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