http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyBxkz_U2g4
David Rovics Plays Song for Cindy Sheehan at Camp Casey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48jHjDJq_Ug
...some lyrics
The president, he told her
He died for a noble cause
But Cindy's wondering
Exactly what that was
Since they never found the weapons
And now that Casey's gone
It seems that oil is the game
And Casey was the pawn
Cindy's got some questions
And so does everyone
Because she is every mother
http://www.nebraskastudies.org/0700/stories/0701_0125.html
Excerpt:
President Herbert Hoover called prohibition "The Noble Experiment" and many observers seemed to agree with this assessment. "Noble" because the goals of keeping families together and reducing or eliminating alcohol abuse were noble goals. An "experiment" because most observers felt like it was an experience that failed. Too many in the country saw nothing wrong with drinking alcohol in moderation.
In fact, many people voted for the amendment thinking that it would still allow light beer and wine which had low alcohol contents. During World War I, there had been an alcohol act that allowed people to drink beer and wine but outlawed hard liquor (which has more alcohol).
Bronfman Family Dynasty Biography part 1/5
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZ5wV7ChUzY&feature=related
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_National_Crime_Syndicate
Excerpt:
With the beginning of Prohibition Rothstein seized the opportunity to use his wealth and connections. He financed large scale liquor importation operations from Europe and Canada, making the most of his prominent associations such as the Bronfman family of Canada.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_P._Kennedy,_Sr.#Early_ventures
Excerpt:
A recurring story about Kennedy is that he made money in bootlegging, the illegal importation and distribution of alcohol during Prohibition. Although there is no hard evidence of this, Kennedy did have extensive investments in the legal importation of spirits. The "bootlegging" story itself may be traceable to Canadian distiller Samuel Bronfman and to New England bootlegger Danny Walsh and his crime syndicate, which did in fact smuggle spirits across the Canadian–American border during this period. Post-Prohibition, Bronfman had a bitter rivalry with Kennedy in acquiring North American liquor distribution rights.[22] At the start of the Franklin Roosevelt administration, Kennedy and James Roosevelt founded Somerset Importers, an entity that acted as the exclusive American agent for Haig & Haig Scotch, Gordon's Dry Gin and Dewar's Scotch.
http://www.qotd.org/search/search.html?aid=3706
Excerpt:
Born: 6 September 1888, Boston, Massachusetts
Died: 18 November 1969, Hyannis Port, Massachusetts
An ambitious boy, this grandson of Irish refugees from the Irish Potato Famine delivered papers and did chores for neighbors. He graduated from Boston Latin School and Harvard University, then married the mayor's daughter Rose Fitzgerald, but had a long string of casual affairs and an extended relationship with actress Gloria Swanson. As manager of a Quincy, Massachusetts shipyard he built ships for the Navy, then refused to deliver some without payment, forcing a legal battle with Secretary of the Navy Franklin Roosevelt. He may have run liquor from Canada into the US during. Prohibition for the Bronfman family, his Somerset Importers became exclusive US agents for Gordon's Gin and Dewar's Scotch and he had huge stocks just offshore when Prohibition ended. He amassed a fortune in banking, shipbuilding, and motion-picture distribution (he organized the merger that created RKO), but moved from stocks to real estate before the crash. He made up with Roosevelt and was one of his key backers in 1932, Roosevelt tagged him to become the first chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission where he outlawed the insider trading and much of the price manipulation he had used to build his wealth. Although he had good relations with some individual Jews, he was strongly anti-Semitic in general. He was named ambassador to Great Britain, but resigned after his opposition to war with Hitler made him unpopular on both sides of the Atlantic. His own presidential aspirations dashed, he devoted himself to the political careers of his sons, Joseph Jr, John, Robert, and Ted. He suffered a severe stroke in 1961; he was confined to a wheelchair and unable to speak for the rest of his life.
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/The-Kennedy-Family/Joseph-P-Kennedy.aspx?p=2
Excerpt:
Making Movies
Kennedy's next career step appears, at first sight, like a radical departure. In 1926, engineering a deal to buy the company Film Booking Offices, he stepped fully into the still-new and burgeoning movie industry. But as with most of Kennedy's business moves, the decision had long roots and was the result of careful observation. As early as 1919, Kennedy had purchased the Maine and New Hampshire Theatres Company, a small chain of New England movie houses. His experience with the chain showed him the promise of the movie business but also that the real money was being made in production rather than distribution. His first connection with FBO was through Hayden, Stone, which had been approached by a British firm that held a controlling interest in the Robertson-Cole Company, the parent organization for FBO. Dissatisfied with the money-losing habits of Robertson-Cole/FBO, its British owners looked to Hayden, Stone for help in finding a buyer in the United States. Because of his interest in the film industry, the project was assigned to Joseph Kennedy, who was also retained as a financial advisor to Robertson-Cole.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloria_Swanson#Marriages_and_relationships
Excerpt:
Later Henri became a film executive representing Pathé (USA) in France through Joseph P. Kennedy, who was running the studio. Many now assume he was given the position which kept him in France for ten months a year to simply keep him out of the way.[48] This marriage ended in divorce in 1930[49] Soon after, Henri was married for a second time, this time to actress Constance Bennett.
While still married to Henri, Swanson had an affair with the married Joseph P. Kennedy for a number of years. He became her business partner and their relationship was an open secret in Hollywood. He took over all of her personal and business affairs and was supposed to make her millions. Unfortunately, after the disastrous Queen Kelly Kennedy left her, and her finances were in worse shape than when he came into her life. Two books have been written about the affair.[50]
After the marriage to Henri and her affair with Kennedy were over, she married Michael Farmer (1902–1975) in August 1931.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Fitzgerald
Excerpt:
| John Francis Fitzgerald | |
|---|---|
 John Francis "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald (February 11, 1863 – October 2, 1950) was an Irish-American politician and the maternal grandfather of three prominent United States politicians—President John Fitzgerald Kennedy (his namesake) and Senators Robert Francis Kennedy and Edward Moore Kennedy |
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0448132/bio
Excerpt:
RKO Pictures, under Kennedy's management, made an $8-million offer (approximately $85 million in 2005 dollars) to Alexander Pantages for his chain of theaters in order to boost RKO's exhibition operations. The Pantages Theater chain consisted of 63 premier, financially robust theaters that were the dominant movie exhibitor and vaudeville circuit in North America west of the Mississippi River. Having partnered with the movie distributor Famous Players (a subsidiary of Paramount Pictures) in 1920, Pantages had converted his theaters into "combo" houses that showed films as well as staged live vaudeville. However, Pantages' expansion effectively was blocked by the dominance of Kennedy's Keith-Albee-Orpheum Circuit in the East, which was now part of RKO (Radio-Keith-Orpheum). After Pantages declined the $8-million offer, Kennedy stopped distributing RKO films to Pantages. Despite the pressure, Pantages declined to knuckle under and sell out. A year later, in 1929, he was charged and tried for the rape of one of his 17-year-old ushers, Eunice Pringle. He was convicted and sentenced to 50 years in prison, but the conviction was overturned on appeal. The trial battered his reputation and strained him emotionally, and he finally relented, accepting Kennedy's revised offer of $3.5 million for his chain. Ronald Kessler, in his book "The Sins of the Father: Joseph P. Kennedy and the Dynasty He Founded" (New York: Warner Books, 1997), recalled the rumor, begun during Pantages' second trial, that RKO had paid Pringle to frame Pantages; however, there is only anecdotal evidence to support this claim.
During Prohibition, Kennedy's company Somerset Importers became the exclusive U.S. agent for Gordon's Dry Gin and Dewar's Scotch. Anticipating the end of Prohibition, he assembled a large inventory of stock that he sold for a profit of millions of dollars when Prohibition was repealed in 1933. One of his partners in the deal was Franklin D. Roosevelt's son, James Roosevelt. Kennedy invested the money from his legal liquor business in real estate, the Merchandise Mart in Chicago and Hialeah Race Track in Hialeah, Florida. However, rumors that he was a "bootlegger," involved in running illegal liquor across the Great Lakes into the U.S. from Canada in cahoots with the Bronfman family and the Mafia, have never been proven.
In 1925 he was retained by the financially troubled owner of Film Booking Office of America (FBO), a "Poverty Row" studio specializing in cheaply made westerns, to help find a new owner. Kennedy formed his own group of investors and bought FBO for $1.5 million. Subsequently, he moved to California in March 1926 to focus on running the studio. At the time movie studios were permitted to also own exhibition companies (a practice that was stopped by a 1947 Supreme Court decision involving Paramount Pictures), so Kennedy launched a hostile buyout of the Keith-Albee-Orpheum Theaters Corporation (KAO), which had more than 700 vaudeville and movie theaters across the U.S. In 1927 he acquired another production studio and film exhibitor, American Pathé, and its Pathé Exchange distribution subsidiary. In October 1928 he formally merged his film companies FBO and KAO with RCA's Photophone Division to form Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO). He topped this off by acquiring the Pantages Theater chain for $3.5 million, creating a major studio in the process with RKO Pictures.
Born in Boston, the son of Patrick J. Kennedy, a successful businessman (liquor) and Irish Catholic community leader active in Democratic Party politics. Joseph attended Boston Latin School, where he was a below average academically but proved popular among his classmates, winning election as class president and playing on the school baseball team. Following the example of several older relatives, he attended Harvard University, where he focused on becoming a social leader, gaining admittance to the prestigious Hasty Pudding Club.
Was a distant cousin of his wife, Rose Kennedy, whom he married in 1914. Rose was the daughter of John F. Fitzgerald, the Democratic mayor of Boston, Massachusetts, who as the fabled "Honey Fitz" was the most recognized politician in the city.
Created RKO Pictures in 1928 by combining his Keith-Albee-Orpheum (KAO) theater chains, Film Booking Office of America (FBO) film production studio and the American Pathé film studio and distribution unit with the Radio Corporation of America's (RCA) Photophone Division. RCA hoped an alliance with Kennedy would allow it to break Western Electric Co.'s near monopoly on the sound-film business, and attempted to interest him in using its Photophone process for FBO Pictures. Kennedy responded by initiating negotiations with RCA boss David Sarnoff that resulted in the creation of the Radio-Keith-Orpheum holding company in October 1928. A master stock manipulator, Kenedy and his confederates drove up the share price of RKO before film production had even begun. Kennedy's interest in the motion picture industry was in making money, not necessarily in making films, and the finances of the new company were shaky. He sold the last of his RKO stock in 1931; RKO went into receivership in 1932, after which it was taken over by interests aligned with Nelson Rockefeller and his brothers. It is estimated that Kennedy made over $5 million (approximiately $54 million in 2005 dollars) from his investments in Hollywood.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, believing that Kennedy knew all of the goings on of the stock market, made him head of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
As early as 1926, he set up a trust fund for the benefit of his wife Rose and the children that were then born. He set up two additional funds in 1936 and 1949. The 1949 trust is the fund that began to set portions of his wealth to his grandchildren. The three funds, plus the Joseph P. Kennedy,Jr. foundation were the chief vehicles for capital conservation. In 1968, the foundation had assets of $22.1 million, and dispersed as much as $1,600,000 to mental retardation research.
When he died in 1969, his estate was estimated to be worth $400 million. His fortune was unusual in many ways, one of which was the fact that unlike most of the wealthiest families in America at the time, he was not heavily invested in oil. He made over $100 million in retirement as a real estate speculator. Another $100 million was in tax exempt securities. The only corporation the money was tied was to the family itself.
No comments:
Post a Comment