Louis Wilson Menk

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/35477645/louis-wilson-menk

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_W._Menk

Louis Wilson Menk (April 8, 1918 - November 27, 1999) was an American railway worker and executive. He served as the last president of Northern Pacific Railway 1966-1970, before the railroad was merged into Burlington Northern Railroad,and the first president and second chairman of Burlington Northern. Menk was also selected as Modern Railroads (now Railway Age) Man of the Year for 1967, an award that has continued annually and is now known as Railroader of the Year.

Early life

Menk was the son of Louis Albert and Daisy Deane (Frantz) Menk. He married Martha Jane Swan on May 30, 1942. They had two children, David Louis and Barbara Ann.

Menk attended University of Denver, and Harvard Business School's six-week Advanced Management Program. He received honorary LL.D. degrees from Northwestern University (1959), Drury College (1965), University of Denver (1966), and Monmouth College.

Career

1937 to 1940, telegrapher, Union Pacific Railroad

1940 to 1965, telegrapher, dispatcher, chief dispatcher, trainmaster, vice-president, president, St. Louis-San Francisco Railway

1965 to 1966, president and director, Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad

October, 1966 [to March, 1970], president and director, Northern Pacific Railway.

1970 to 1981, president(1970-71),CEO(1971-78),chairman(1971-1981), Burlington Northern

1982-1983,Chairman, International Harvester (CEO May-November 1982)

Directorships

Chicago, Burlington and Quincy; Colorado and Southern; Northern Pacific Transport; Cuyuna Realty; Monad Company; Association of American Railroads; First National Bank of Chicago; American Investment Company; Servomation Corporation; First Trust of St. Paul; Hunt Foods; General Mills; Brown Shoe Company.

Community Involvement

Clubs: St. Paul; Metro; Improvement Commission Greater St. Paul United Fund; Upper Midwest Development Council; St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce; Government Council on Executive Reorganization; Advisory Committee, Minnesota Department of Economic Development; Transportation Center, Northwestern University; Chicago Area Council; Boy Scouts of America; Indianhead Committee; Summit School; Minnesota Club of St. Paul; St. Paul Athletic Club; Somerset Country Club; Transportation Club of St. Paul; Traffic Club of Minnesota; Traffic Club of Chicago; Union League of Chicago; Glen View Country Club; Chicago Club; Noonday; Bellerive Country Club; Masons; Presbyterian.

Papers

Louis Menk papers, 1953-1981.

Correspondence, speeches, scrapbooks, memorabilia, printed matter, and related papers documenting the career of this railroad executive who was president of the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Company (1962–1965), the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Company (1965–1966), the Northern Pacific Railway Company (1966–1970), and Burlington Northern Inc. (1970–1978, and chairman 1978-1981). He was also one of the principal architects of the 1970 merger that created the Burlington Northern; 21.5 cu ft (0.61 m3). (18 boxes and 4 microfilm reels).

Publications

Menk, Louis W. A Railroad Man Looks At America; Excerpts from the Speeches of Louis W. Menk. No place: privately published, n.d. [circa 1974].

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Louis W. Menk was born April 8, 1918, the son of Louis A. Menk, a Union Pacific brakeman, and Daisy Deane (Frantz) Menk, a schoolteacher. He grew up in the Denver suburb of Englewood, Colorado, and attended the University of Denver for about two years while working nights as a Union Pacific messenger.

Menk left college in 1940 to take a job as a telegrapher in Tulsa, Oklahoma with the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway (Frisco). For the next 25 years he rose steadily through the Operation Department ranks of the Frisco: train dispatcher (Tulsa), assistant trainmaster (Tulsa and Newburg, Mo.), trainmaster (Thayer, Mo.), assistant superintendent (Chaffee and Newburg, Mo.), terminal trainmaster (Memphis, Tenn.), and superintendent (Fort Smith, Ark., Memphis, and Tulsa). From 1953 to 1960 he was stationed at regional headquarters in Springfield, Missouri, where he rose to regional vice-president of the company. He was later transferred to corporate headquarters in St. Louis where he served as vice president-operation (1960-1962), president (1962-1965), and chairman (1964-1965).

During his Frisco presidency he was generally credited with modernizing the company's management and with increasing its operating efficiency and earnings. His success led to his 1965 recruitment by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad (Burlington), a company more than double the Frisco's size, to succeed outgoing president Harry Murphy. During his year in Chicago as Burlington president, the company's earnings increased over 100 percent, resulting in his October 1966 election to the presidency of the Northern Pacific Railway (NP), one of the Burlington's parent companies. His railroading success attracted national attention and he was named 1966 "Railroad Man of the Year" by Modern Railroads magazine.

In 1967 he was made chief executive officer of the NP, and for the next three years he worked to secure the long-sought merger of the NP, the Great Northern Railway, the Burlington, and the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway. On March 1, 1970 the merged entity, renamed Burlington Northern Inc. (BN), was formally established and Menk was elected its first president. In 1971 he was elected chief executive officer and chairman of the board, and in 1978 he resigned his chief executive post to pursue the chairmanship full time.

BN reorganized itself in 1981 as a holding company controlling the assets of eight separate operating companies, and during that year Menk retired from the corporation's chairmanship. In 1982 he was elected chairman and chief executive officer of the International Harvester Company. At the end of that he relinquished the CEO responsibilities while retaining the chairmanship. Menk retired as chairman in August, 1983.

Menk was active throughout his career in rail industry organizations, and served as a director of the Association of American Railroads and the Transportation Association of America. He also served as a director of about a dozen other business corporations in a variety of industries. He has been active in chamber of commerce activities in various locales, in United Way and Community Chest drives, and in other community business and social service activities. He was long active in the Boy Scouts of America, serving in various executive capacities with national and regional scouting organizations. Menk also served on the boards of trustees of several colleges and universities, and was especially active on that of his alma mater, the University of Denver.

Menk was married in 1942 to Martha Jane Swan of Tulsa, Oklahoma, and has two children: David Louis Menk and Barbara Ann (Menk) Ambrose. Martha died September 14, 1983, and Louis died November 23, 1999.

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Louis Wilson Menk, a railroad entrepreneur who wove three medium-size companies into the huge Burlington Northern, then helped rescue the faltering industrial giant International Harvester, has died at 81.

He died Tuesday in the Phoenix suburb of Carefree, Ariz.

Mr. Menk was the son of a Colorado trainman.

After finishing high school in 1936, he studied at Denver University for two years while learning Morse code as a messenger for the Union Pacific. Within a year, his skill as a telegrapher took him to a dispatcher's job with the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway. That experience earned him a promotion to assistant trainmaster.

Mr. Menk rose rapidly at St. Louis-San Francisco, becoming president in 1962; he added the title of chairman in 1964.

In 1965, the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad drew him away to take over as president of Burlington Lines. He played a key role as the industry shifted emphasis from passenger transit to freight.

He led the merger of the Great Northern, Northern Pacific and Burlington Railroads into Burlington Northern; he then served it as president, chairman and chief executive. He retired in 1981.

It later merged with the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad to form the present Burlington Northern Santa Fe, one of North America's largest rail networks.

In 1982, International Harvester, maker of trucks and farm equipment, was on the brink of bankruptcy, and Mr. Menk was asked to take over the company.

In 20 months, he led a reorganization, oversaw cutbacks and installed a new management team. He served as chairman and chief executive of the company, now known as Navistar International Corp., and returned to Carefree in 1983 for his second retirement.