Ken Behring

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kenneth Eugene Behring (born June 13, 1928^[1] in Freeport, Illinois) is a real estate developer, former owner of the Seattle Seahawks football team, and philanthropist.

Contents 1 Early years 2 Career 3 Family 4 Philanthrophy 5 Controversies 5.1 Sexual harassment 5.2 Hunting 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Early years

Ken Behring was born in Freeport, Illinois. His family moved to Monroe, Wisconsin, when he was four. He grew up in poverty; his father worked in a lumber yard, and his mother cleaned houses. Ken started working a variety of jobs around town starting at age seven: mowing lawns, caddying, transporting milk, selling newspapers, working at a grocery store and at a lumberyard. He became a salesperson at Montgomery Ward at age 16, and started a side business selling sporting goods in town. Behring attended Monroe High School in Monroe, Wisconsin. A high school football player, he received a partial football scholarship to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, but dropped out of college due to an injury that left him unable to play football, and therefore ineligible for his scholarship.^[2][3]

[edit] Career

Out of college, Behring, a car buff, worked as a salesperson at a Chevrolet and Chrysler auto dealerships. At age 21, he started a used car business called Behring Motors in Monroe, Wisconsin.^[2] He went on to own Car-a-Mat, a chain of car washes.^[4] A savvy businessman, he was earning $50,000 a year and had $1 million in assets by age 27.^[5]

Ken Behring moved to Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1956 (at age 28), where he established the Behring Construction Company. He became a land developer, founding a new retirement community in the city of Tamarac, Florida ("Car-a-Mat" spelled backwards).^[2] The new city was incorporated on July 25, 1963, built on an area that was formerly wetlands, pastures, and fields. According to Jack Leff, a former member of the City of Tamarac's Public Information Board, Ken Behring "envisioned a retirement community living in reasonably priced homes. He offered a home with lots of land and practically no maintenance for the homeowner. Thus was born a new concept for gracious adult living."^[6]

Behring's company eventually became the largest builder of single-family homes in Florida^[7], and the tenth largest in the United States.^[2]

In 1972, Ken Behring moved to the San Francisco Bay Area^[8], where he was involved in developing the country club at Blackhawk, California, and later, the Canyon Lakes Development in San Ramon, California.^[8][9]

In 1988, Behring and partner Ken Hofmann purchased the NFL's Seattle Seahawks football team for $79 or $99 million (both numbers have been reported).^[5][10] They transferred the team's operations to Anaheim, California in 1996, a widely criticized move. They sold the team to Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen in 1997, for $200 million.^[10]

Ken Behring has been listed several times on the annual Forbes 400 list of richest Americans, including 1991^[11], 1995^[11], and 1997^[4]. In 1997, his last year on the list^[12], he ranked #395, with an estimated net worth of $495 million.^[4]

In 2004, Behring published a memoir called Road to Purpose: One Man's Journey Bringing Hope to Millions and Finding Purpose Along the Way (ISBN 0-9761912-0-2).^[13]

Behring was made a member of the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans in 2006.^[14]

[edit] Family

Ken Behring married his wife Patricia (Pat) at age 21. They have five sons, and as of 2005, ten grandchildren.^[15]

[edit] Philanthrophy

Ken Behring was involved in founding the Blackhawk Museum (originally the Blackhawk Automotive Museum) in 1988.^[8]

Behring pledged $20 million to the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History in 1997, endowing the museum's new Kenneth E. Behring Family Hall of Mammals. He pledged another $80 million to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History in 2000; the museum renamed its main facility the "Behring Center" in his honor.^[7] MuseumNews called it "purportedly the largest cash donation ever to be given to a U.S. museum by a living person,"^[3] and Behring was given the Smithsonian's James Smithson Award for his contributions.^[16]

In 2000, Behring donated $7.5 million to expand the University of California, Berkeley's Principal Leadership Institute; the newly established Kenneth E. Behring Center for Educational Improvement focused on training programs for public school principals.^[17][18] UC Berkeley awarded him a Chancellor's Citation in 2001.^[19]

Behring founded the Wheelchair Foundation in Blackhawk, California in 2000, to provide free wheelchairs for people with physical disabilities in developing nations unable to afford one.^[16]

In 2005, Behring founded the WaterLeaders Foundation, a nonprofit working to support safe drinking water around the world.^[20]

[edit] Controversies

[edit] Sexual harassment

A 1999 story in Seattle Weekly reported that "Behring...settled several sex harassment claims in recent years."^[21] The most prominent of these cases was the 1996 allegation by former employee Patricia Parker that she had been sexually harassed over the course of two years, and assaulted at a New Year's Day event.^[21][22] The New York Times reported that Parker "accused Behring of making advances, asking her to pick up his prescription sex-enhancing drugs and requiring she keep waivers on hand for his potential sex partners to sign away their rights to demand money of him."^[23] Behring denied the charges^[22], and the case was settled out of court in 1996.^[23]

[edit] Hunting

Ken Behring started hunting as a young boy, to help provide food for his family.^[2] He became an avid big-game hunter as an adult, and a president of hunting organization Safari Club International.^[24] He has made multiple safari trips to East Africa^[25], and has shot lions, leopards, rhinoceroses, an elephant, and an endangered bighorn sheep.^[26] Behring has been criticized for his trophy hunting practices and animal conversation ethics.

In 1997, Behring shot an endangered KaraTau argali sheep in Kazakhstan (only 100 remained in the world at the time); the animal could not be legally imported into the United States.^[24] He donated $20 million to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History six weeks later, offering his private collection of stuffed hunting trophies to the museum, including four rare bighorn sheep, one of which was the KaraTau argali sheep.^[27] The Smithsonian attempted to import the remains by petitioning the Department of the Interior for an Endangered Species Act waiver, but withdrew its request after questioning and negative publicity from Representative George Miller and groups like the Humane Society of the United States.^[28][29] Behring maintained that he had broken no laws, and had shot the animal legally while assisting Kazakh scientists^[26][30].

In 1998, Behring shot and killed an elephant in Mozambique, where the sport killing of elephants was banned in 1990. His hunting companions killed two more elephants. Local investigators reported that the group used a helicopter during the hunt, which "drove the elephants onto their guns" -- a charge they denied. Behring's lawyer produced a permit from a Mozambique provincial governor authorizing the hunting of a lion, leopard, and buffalo, with a handwritten addition noting "problem elephants," the only exception to the national ban on the killing of elephants. The then-director of the game reserve near where the elephants had been killed was skeptical, telling ABC News PrimeTime "They came in there and bankrolled an operation to take out some big elephant, and it is wrong. And nobody, nobody can condone what happened."^[27]

[edit] See also

• Seattle Seahawks: includes discussion of Behring's ownership of team
• Blackhawk, California: discusses Behring's development plans, and community opposition

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Biography from the Horatio Alger Association
• Biography from the Wheelchair Foundation

Persondata
NAME	Behring, Kenneth E.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Behring, Ken; Behring, Kenneth
SHORT DESCRIPTION	American real estate developer, former owner of the Seattle Seahawks football team, and philanthropist
DATE OF BIRTH	June 13, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH	Freeport, Illinois
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH