Paul Kalmanovitz (1905–1987) was a millionaire brewing and real estate
magnate
The magnate term, from the late Latin ''magnas'', a great man, itself from Latin ''magnus'', "great", means a man from the higher nobility, a man who belongs to the high office-holders, or a man in a high social position, by birth, wealth or ot ...
best known for owning all or part of several national breweries and their products, including
Falstaff Brewing Company and
Pabst Brewing Company
The Pabst Brewing Company () is an American company that dates its origins to a brewing company founded in 1844 by Jacob Best and was, by 1889, named after Frederick Pabst. It is currently a holding company which contracts the brewing of over ...
. Most of the Kalmanovitz Estate was left to create a
charitable foundation
A foundation (also a charitable foundation) is a category of nonprofit organization or charitable trust that typically provides funding and support for other charitable organizations through grants, but may also engage directly in charitable act ...
for hospitals and universities.
Biography
Kalmanovitz was born to a
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
family in
Łódź
Łódź, also rendered in English as Lodz, is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located approximately south-west of Warsaw. The city's coat of arms is an example of canti ...
,
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
. While Paul emigrated to
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...
at the end of the
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, his father, mother, and brothers remained in Lodz. He later worked for
Sir Edmund Henry Hynman Allenby. Kalmanowitz arrived in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
in the 1926 by jumping a merchant marine ship and jumped from job to job, working for several notable people such as
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
,
William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst Sr. (; April 29, 1863 – August 14, 1951) was an American businessman, newspaper publisher, and politician known for developing the nation's largest newspaper chain and media company, Hearst Communications. His flamboya ...
, and
Louis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer (; born Lazar Meir; July 12, 1882 or 1884 or 1885 – October 29, 1957) was a Canadian-American film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industr ...
(MGM).
In 1945, Paul Kalmanovitz received a letter from his niece, Sonia Kalmanowicz, the daughter of his oldest brother Joseph Kalmanowicz. In this letter, she informed Paul that his brother had been murdered in
Auschwitz
Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...
in 1944, but that she and her brother Stanislas had survived Auschwitz. He immediately arranged to apply for a visa number for them to enter the United States. By 1946, Stanislas was granted a visa; by then, Sonia had decided to remain in France. Stanislas departed from Le Havre in April 1946 in steerage on the SS Oregon, a ship of WWI vintage.
When Paul entered the US he changed the spelling of the family name from Kalmanowicz to Kalmanovitz. When Stanislav arrived in New York he changed his name to Stanley Kalmanovitz.
Paul was in New York to pick up his nephew and accompany him to his home in Tarzana, California.
In 1950 Kalmanovitz acquired the Maier Brewing Company in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
,
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
thus entering the brewing industry. Maier Brewing, makers of Brew 102, struggled for a number of years, and in 1958 faced an effort to be purchased by the Falstaff Brewing Company. Kalmanovitz refused to be bought out, after being threatened by Falstaff to either sell or Falstaff would bury the Maier Brewery. Within a few years Kalmanovitz returned the Maier Brewery to profitability. Along with the brewery and numerous other investments, Kalmanovitz's net worth increased. In 1970 Kalmanovitz purchased
Lucky Lager
Lucky Lager is an American lager with U.S. brewing and distribution rights held by the Pabst Brewing Company. Originally launched in 1934 by the San Francisco-based General Brewing Company, Lucky Lager grew to be one of the prominent beers of ...
and merged it with Maier Brewing Company to form the General Brewing Company with S&P Corporation as its parent.
By 1974 Falstaff was in need of cash. Falstaff's purchase of the
Ballantine brands in 1972 proved to be a mistake and stretched the company's finances. Falstaff sold Kalmanovitz its
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
brewery. The cash did not save Falstaff; in 1975 the company was again in trouble. Kalmanovitz offered to inject $20 million into Falstaff for 100,000 shares of preferred stock. On 28 April 1975, Paul Kalmanovitz gained controlling interest in Falstaff Brewing Company. Kalmanovitz more than quadrupled his brewery interests and became a major force on the American beer market.
With the purchase of Falstaff, Kalmanovitz moved the Falstaff headquarters from
St Louis
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
,
Missouri
Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...
to San Francisco to combine it with General Brewing Company's headquarters. By June, more than 175 of Falstaff's corporate employees were laid off. The
United States Securities and Exchange Commission
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government, created in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The primary purpose of the SEC is to enforce the law against market ...
(SEC) opened an investigation of the Falstaff purchase, and found it provided shareholders with false and misleading information. Kalmanovitz was prohibited from committing further securities laws violations and Falstaff stock was barred from trading and removed from the
New York Stock Exchange
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed c ...
. Falstaff appealed all the way to the US Supreme Court and lost.
Falstaff workers unhappy with the new direction of the company staged a company
lockout
Lockout may refer to:
* Lockout (industry), a type of work stoppage
**Dublin Lockout, a major industrial dispute between approximately 20,000 workers and 300 employers 1913 - 1914
* Lockout (sports), lockout in sports leagues
**MLB lockout, lock ...
, which Kalmanovitz and General Brewing called a strike.
Eventually Falstaff production resumed. Kalmanovitz's plans to make a profit off Falstaff were not to turn the company around and reestablish its brand strength in the market, but rather to cut costs drastically. The biggest change was the advertising budget where Kalmanovitz eliminated all types of marketing. Falstaff's market share continued to slide, resulting in plants closing and employees out of work. Falstaff was profitable for the S&P Corporation, but at a cost to works and the communities around the breweries. Kalmanovitz acquired an ailing brewery, fired the corporate personnel, reduced budgets, sold equipment, stopped plant maintenance, and eliminated product quality control. Kalmanovitz established a standard with Falstaff that was repeated as he purchased
Stroh's
The Stroh Brewery Company was a beer brewery in Detroit, Michigan. In addition to its own Stroh's brand, the company produced or bought the rights to several other brands including Goebel, Schaefer, Schlitz, Augsburger, Erlanger, Old Style, L ...
,
National Bohemian
National Bohemian Beer, colloquially Natty Boh, is an American lager originating from Baltimore, Maryland. It was first brewed in 1885 by the National Brewing Company, but was eventually purchased by Pabst Brewing Company.
Nearly 90 percent of ...
,
Olympia
The name Olympia may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Film
* ''Olympia'' (1938 film), by Leni Riefenstahl, documenting the Berlin-hosted Olympic Games
* ''Olympia'' (1998 film), about a Mexican soap opera star who pursues a career as an athlet ...
,
Pearl
A pearl is a hard, glistening object produced within the soft tissue (specifically the mantle) of a living shelled mollusk or another animal, such as fossil conulariids. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is composed of calcium carb ...
, and
Pabst Pabst is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include:
*Adolf Pabst (1899–1990), American mineralogist and geologist
*Daniel Pabst (1826–1910), American furniture maker
*Frederick Pabst (1836–1904), American brewer
*Georg Wilhelm ...
.
Breweries were not Kalmanovitz's only interests; he was involved in helping
Guide Dogs for the Blind
Guide Dogs for the Blind (GDB) is a guide dog school located in the United States, with campuses in San Rafael, California, and Boring, Oregon. It was founded in 1942 by Lois Merrihew and Don Donaldson to help veterans who had been blinded in Wo ...
and several other charitable organizations. Upon his death, Kalmanovitz's net worth was reputed to be in excess of $250 million. A sizable portion of his wealth was donated to numerous California hospitals. His estate also donated funds for the Paul and Lydia Kalmanovitz Library at the
University of California, San Francisco
The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a public land-grant research university in San Francisco, California. It is part of the University of California system and is dedicated entirely to health science and life science. It cond ...
, Kalmanovitz Hall at the
University of San Francisco
The University of San Francisco (USF) is a private Jesuit university in San Francisco, California. The university's main campus is located on a setting between the Golden Gate Bridge and Golden Gate Park. The main campus is nicknamed "The Hil ...
, and the Paul and Lydia Kalmanovitz Appellate Courtroom at the
University of California, Davis School of Law
The University of California, Davis School of Law (Martin Luther King Jr. Hall), referred to as UC Davis School of Law and commonly known as King Hall, is the professional graduate law school of the University of California, Davis. The school rece ...
(King Hall).
Criticism
Kalmanovitz specialized in
leveraged buy-out
A leveraged buyout (LBO) is one company's acquisition of another company using a significant amount of borrowed money (leverage) to meet the cost of acquisition. The assets of the company being acquired are often used as collateral for the loan ...
s, which take over businesses to sell off their parts for profit, closing plants and laying off employees. After a takeover in St. Louis, brewery employees flew the American flag at half-staff and upside down.
In 1975, after Kalmanovitz gained control of Falstaff, most of its 175 corporate office employees were laid off. Some of the employee's severance checks bounced. "Kalmanovitz thought nothing of throwing hundreds of brewery workers out onto the streets, cutting off their pension and health benefits … " according to one historian. Forbes magazine wrote that "Kalmanovitz went through Falstaff like Grant through Richmond. ... He took no prisoners."
In a 1979 court case, Bloor v. Falstaff, Kalmanovitz's brewery was fined $1.3 million. The judges described his management style as "Profit Uber Alles".
Personally, he has been described as mean-spirited, controlling and eccentric. He banned telephones from his office and every time he would catch his employees installing a line, he would rip it out.
After his death, a former legal secretary said, his associates toasted him with
Jack Daniel's
Jack Daniel's is a brand of Tennessee whiskey. It is produced in Lynchburg, Tennessee, by the Jack Daniel Distillery, which has been owned by the Brown–Forman Corporation since 1956.
Packaged in square bottles, Jack Daniel's "Black Label" T ...
, saying, "Ding dong the king is dead."
Paul Kalmanovitz, whose mother and brothers died in the ghetto of Lodz and the Auschwitz concentration camp, denied he was Jewish until he died. In addition he told all of his associates that he had no family left alive, while to the contrary his nephew, Stanley Kalmanovitz, and his niece Sophie Kalmanovitz (who died in 2015), both of whom survived Auschwitz, were alive during his life.
Other Kalmanovitz breweries
*
Lone Star Brewing Company
The Lone Star Brewery, built in 1884, was the first large mechanized brewery in Texas. Adolphus Busch, of Anheuser-Busch, founded it along with a group of San Antonio businessmen. The castle-like building which was once its brewery now houses ...
*
Pearl Brewing Company
The Pearl Brewing Company (also known as the Pearl Brewery or just Pearl) was an American brewery established in 1883 in Downtown San Antonio, Texas, United States. In 1985, Pearl's parent company purchased the Pabst Brewing Company and assumed ...
*
Walter Brewing Company, Pueblo, Colorado
Notes
External links
*
Falstaff history- Includes tidbits of Paul Kalmanovitz's history
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kalmanovitz, Paul
American brewers
Jewish American philanthropists
Polish emigrants to the United States
20th-century Polish Jews
1905 births
1987 deaths
20th-century American businesspeople
American real estate businesspeople
20th-century American philanthropists
People from Łódź
20th-century American Jews
Burials at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park