Yale "George" Newman

From Michael. I am Michael Newman, the eldest son of Yale George Newman from his marriage to June Louisa Williams in early 1951. Yale changed his name to George Yale Newman to sound more modern in business circles of the time and was known as Yale by his brothers and sisters.

Yale was born in New Haven, CT on November 3, 1904. I’m not certain of his birth year as my mother told me Yale was 51 when I was born, which would seem to imply an earlier birthdate. June was 25 years old when she gave birth to me.

I’m writing this to clarify the stories shared about Yale, which I believe to have veered from the truth about the father I knew well.

Yale was a very bright, sensitive and observant young boy who had to grow up early and learn to take care of himself, as well as contribute to his family’s income. He did not show an interest in music like his brothers, but he loved to read to solve problems, not for fun. He was also gifted in writing, communication and mathematics, having a natural understanding of geometry and algebra, which I discovered in junior high school when he helped me with my homework.

Yale saw business opportunities at a very young age. While in the 6th grade, there was a significant rat problem in his neighborhood. Yale had an interest in chemistry, and went to a local library to look up the ingredients and processes necessary to make rat poison in his mom’s kitchen. He then sold his rat poison door-to-door throughout the neighborhood. This was so successful, Yale was bringing home more money that his father, “Black Mike” as my dad called him, and this created a controversy which escalated to the point my father ran away from home. Black Mike was a physically abusive father, and often took it out on Yale.

Yale wasn’t particularly tall, but was tall enough to be sat at the back of class in school. He needed prescription glasses, and now that he was making money with rat poison, went to his mom to get money to purchase a pair of glasses. He was refused. So Yale took some of the money which he earned from his mom’s purse, and purchased a set of glasses. When he later returned home with the glasses, his mom said he would certainly get a beating from his dad for taking the money. At 12 years old, Yale had enough, and decided to run away with his friend, Harry Letruvnik. He packed up his few things, and waited in the bedroom where all the brothers shared a bed, behind the bedroom door with a baseball bat. When Black Mike charged in the room yelling for Yale, Yale hit his dad on the back of his neck and ran out the door.

Yale and Harry Letruvnik hitch-hiked into New York City to sign on as ordinary seamen on a tramp steamer going anywhere. They shared a room at a flophouse hotel, covering their beds with newspaper to protect them from bedbugs. Harry couldn’t take it and returned home. Yale found a ship that would hire him, and befriended the head cook, who Yale helped with service among his other duties. Yale got to eat scraps from the Captain’s mess, and while eating post service, overheard the 2nd cook laughing that rats had gotten into the seamen’s coffee, but never mind, the seamen wouldn’t notice any rat turds ground up in the coffee anyway. Yale got in a fight with the 2nd cook over the matter, and when they reached the port of Cape Town, South Africa, he jumped ship. He was barely 13 and went to a U.S. Embassy and asked for help. After a few weeks, Yale was sent home as a passenger, with the Embassy arranging for his fare.

As a young man, Yale continued to make a living as an ordinary seaman, traveling to ports all over the world and the U.S., returning to New York City to find other work. Yale was a great story-teller, and as a young teenager returning to New York from his adventures at sea, would befriend people in restaurants, and use the familiarity to “arrange” a free dinner from time to time, exiting the restaurant before the other patron and leaving him the bill. In upstate New York, Yale sold residential real estate so well, other realtors ran him out of town for not having a license. He worked for a carney operator and saved enough money to buy a used Stutz Bearcat automobile which he loved, though he was never a good driver.

Yale sought opportunities in Miami Beach, opening a fire extinguisher inspection company focused on servicing hotels and restaurants. Later, Yale somehow became a U.S Government Man, a “G-Man,” working on counterfeit currency cases, and through this met many of the famous mob figures as they frequented the same night clubs and chased the same women friends.

As World War II was ending, Yale’s chemistry sense saw an opportunity to increase the useful life of news-type in news and magazine printing of all kinds with a chrome plating process which kept the lead ink from sticking to the news-type. As a charmer and a great story-teller with stories to tell, Yale met Maurice Parker in Rhode Island, an early “angel investor,” and pitched his idea to open a chrome plating plant to focus on the printing industry, extending the life of their news type. Maurice put a group of investors together and the Electrolyzing Corporation, Providence was opened. The success in Providence led to expansion into Chicago to serve the Detroit automotive industry and expansion in Los Angeles to serve the growing aviation industry.

Flying between Providence, Los Angeles and Chicago, Yale and June built a home and settled in Flossmoor, IL southwest of Chicago, a short drive to Electrolyzing in Chicago Heights, IL. As it turned out, the entire Chicago mob leadership lived on Cambridge Avenue, the same street on which Yale and June built a custom house, a mid-century modern with glass walls across one entire side of the 100 foot long structure. The view out these windows looked out over the homes of the Frank Laporte and his captains. Frank made the cover of Life Magazine as the Chicago Syndicate’s leading mobster.

The FBI showed up on our doorstep one day, and requested to set up cameras to capture the comings and goings of our neighbors. Yale strongly declined, and took this opportunity to introduce himself to Frank, and shared honestly that the FBI had visited him. Yale assured Frank there would be no FBI surveillance cooperation and that he simply wanted to be a neighbor minding his own business. Yale and Frank actually became friendly, and Frank would ask Yale to walk through his legitimate trucking, vending, pin-ball and similar businesses to give him advice… let him know where his people might be “stealing” from him or how he could run the businesses better. Our respective families enjoyed simple, summer barbeque dinners together, with occasional softball games between all of the dads and children.

Yale did not complete the 6th grade in school, yet he ended up founding and building as its President, the Electrolyzing Corporation, a metallurgical engineering firm later specializing in custom, precision plating for the automotive and aviation industries. Electrolyzing had a staff of engineers that worked under his direction, solving metallurgical problems having to do with wear. Yale was able to gain highest level security clearance to the U.S Airforce Strategic Air Command, helping to resolve the failure of landing gear components which required his taking one of the 3 seats on a flight in the supersonic, B-58 Hustler, as well as developing coatings for the nose-cones of various missile systems.

Electrolyzing’s factories grew in Providence, RI, Chicago, IL and Los Angeles, CA, attracting the attention of Victor Pozner, known as one of the highest-paid business executives of his generation and a pioneer of the leveraged buyout. Electrolyzing was sold to Pozner’s NVF Co. Yale served in the board of directors of NVF Co and Sharon Steel, one of the subsidiaries of NVF. For many years, Yale was Pozner’s secret operations turn-around guy, who built Pozner’s reputation as a business turn-around artist finding unrealized gains in undervalued company acquisitions.

While Electrolyzing was growing, so was a sleepy town called Las Vegas, which exploded with gambling, entertainment, fine hotels and dining. One of Yale’s foibles was his love of card games and dice. Yale and his brothers would meet in Las Vegas, and frequented some of the classic and newer hotels of the time including the Sahara, the Dunes and the International. Yale was a comp’d player, and arranged rooms, food service, and entertainment for the Newman clan, and during this period, never said no to a lunch or dinner check. The age differential between Yale and June resulted in divorce, with Yale so distraught as a result, he sought consolation in ego boosts through Las Vegas gambling trips. Yale squandered a fortune in Vegas, but was loved by all who knew him.

To close, I want to share a bit about Yale Newman as a father. Having been abused, Yale turned from his horrible childhood, and purposed to be a kind and gentle dad. He never raised a hand to me, my brothers or half-sister. He never even raised his voice to us. When I misbehaved, which frankly wasn’t often, Yale would simply sit down with me at the kitchen table or at my bedside if I had gone to bed before he returned home, and have a soft-spoken conversation with me. I always wanted to have my dad’s approval, so these quiet discussions were real motivators.

And my dad also found time to teach me how to play baseball very well. We played every day after he returned from work in spring and summer. He coached my little league baseball team from the bottom of the league to win the Flossmoor Little League Title in 1961, as I remember. He taught us fundamentals at every position and made us just have fun. I was then proud of my father, and remain proud of him to this day. I miss him every day, and often wish he were still around to provide advice.

From Randy: Yale lived in a suburb of Chicago for many years when he was married to Dorothy, who was a very nice woman. He lived next door to Tony Accardo, a boss of the Chicago mafia family. The FBI wanted to set up cameras to watch Accardo. George refused to let them do that. When George was 11 or so, maybe older, the story is, that someone sent him out to pick up a pack of cigarettes. He was gone for 10 years. When he came back, he had a car and a gun which he showed to Emil and my father. I don't know whether he explained the gun, I think he intimated that he was a g-man. In the morning after his return, he took the boys downstairs to take them for a ride in his car. There was a bum sleeping it off in the back seat of the car. Yale yanked the guy out of the car into the gutter and pistol-whipped him. My father begged him to stop. Emil turned away and vomited. During WWI, George was said to have sold more War Bonds than anyone in Florida which is where he must of gone when he went to get the cigarettes. Many years later, in the 50's I think, my father told me that George rented a factory in Santa Monica. He found in my father's old med school chemistry text a formula for something to do with protecting metals from corrosion and damage at high temperatures or now that I recall, it was just a simple formula that involved metals. He then hired guards to patrol the area surrounding the factory and made a great show that something very important was being done in that factory. This attracted the interest of some executives at Douglas Aircraft. I think George, who was very bright despite not finishing the 6th grade, thought of something to sell them. I think he sold them the formula from the 1936 textbook. That is what my dad told me. That's all I know. I think George was a bit of a mystery even to his brothers.

From CARROLL: To add to Randy's story about George and the S.M. warehouse..... My mom had additional information to this mysterious factory. Her brother, John McQuaig, who was a "genius" (designed weapons for our government), was hired by George to work in the factory as a "designer/developer" (whatever the term was in those days). Johnny was very secretive about it and couldn't/wouldn't say what it was he was actually doing for George.