Financial History Issue 126 (Summer 2018) | Page 27
Left to right: Ron Falahi, Kirk Kerkorian and former professional boxer “Iron Mike” Tyson.
into a globe-hopping search for loans to
finance additional stock buys. But by Octo-
ber 1969, the war was over. Bronfman was
ousted, and the Kerkorian team installed.
MGM’s corporate headquarters in New York
was moved back to Southern California.
One week after completing his MGM
takeover, Kerkorian also tightened his grip
on Western Air Lines. His increasingly bit-
ter rival Drinkwater was “kicked upstairs”
to a ceremonial post on the board of direc-
tors. Kerkorian picked his replacement.
The turbulent 1960s were coming to
an end, a decade of social and political
change for the country that turned out to
be Kerkorian’s breakout decade as well—
the formative years of an unlikely tycoon.
To the US financial media, he seemed
to have burst onto the scene from out of
nowhere, and they weren’t far off. The pen-
niless dropout who shoveled manure for
his crack at the American dream broke into
big-time media as the focus of a lengthy
feature in Fortune magazine’s November
1969 edition. The article explored Kerkori-
an’s leisure industry vision and estimated
his net worth as a movie mogul, airline
owner and casino magnate at $260 million.
In what would turn out to be one of only
a few press interviews in his lifetime, the
52-year-old Kerkorian served notice to For-
tune that he had no interest in early retire-
ment. “What would you have me do—sit
around with a mint julep in my hand?”
At the same time, he acknowledged
having come a long way from his humble
roots. “There was a time when I was aim-
ing at $100,000. Then, I thought I’d have
it made if I got a million dollars. Now, it
isn’t the money.”
Kerkorian would go on to remake Las
Vegas, controlling the town’s top gaming
properties and taking on a new generation
of casino tycoons more than 30 years later
when he bought out Steve Wynn’s Mirage
holdings.
Kerkorian would buy