Chris-Craft Industries

Chris-Craft Industries, Inc.

Former type	public holding corporation
Industry	Television Broadcasting Other Plastics Product Manufacturing Unsupported Plastics Film and Sheet (Except Packaging) Manufacturing
Fate	Sold to News Corporation
Successor	News Corporation
Founded	1928
Defunct	2001
Headquarters	New York, New York, {USA}
Key people	Herbert J. Siegel (chair)
Products	boats, hospital laundry bags, carpet fibers, insulation, and chemical products
Revenue	$467.1 million (1998)
Divisions	Boats Roamer Steel Boats Division
Subsidiaries	BHC Communications, Inc. (79.96%) Chris-Craft Industrial Products, Inc. [1]

Chris-Craft Industries, Inc., formerly National Automotive Fibers, Inc., was a publicly-held American corporation traded on the New York and Pacific Stock Exchanges.^[1] It later took on the name of one of its acquisitions, Chris-Craft Boats. This forebear was founded in the late 19th century by Christopher Columbus Smith, and became famous for mahogany hulled powerboats in the 1920s through the 1950s.

History

National Automotive Fibers

National Automotive Fibers (NAF) was formed in Detroit in 1928 as a manufacturer of upholstery, carpeting, interior trim, plastic products for Chrysler Motors, Ford Motors and Studebaker-Packard, all automobile companies. While successful, the company was only a minor automotive supplier. In the 1940s, NAF purchased the Montrose Chemical Company of San Francisco, but was still centered on the auto industry. In 1956, the company suffered a major loss of $1 million against sales of $46 million. Paul V. Shields, a senior partner of Shields & Company, a Wall Street investment firm, acquired National as he saw that NAF was overdependent on the auto industry but had growth potential. Shields trimmed NAF's product line and diversified the company into oil and gas operations, television and radio broadcasting. With this diverse portfolio, the company was renamed the NAFI Corporation in 1959. This brought a record profit of $1 million against lowered sales with assets of $10 million.^[1] NAF and Bing Crosby teamed up to purchase a television station, KPTV, for $4 million on September 1, 1959.^[2] A Bing Crosby led group sold KCOP-TV in 1960 to the Corporation.^[3]

Chris-Craft Industries

Chris-Craft Boats was an independent company until it was acquired by Shields & Company's NAFI Corporation in 1960 and merged with NAFI. They renamed the merged company Chris-Craft Industries, Incorporated in 1962.^[1] In 1962, the company acquired the Old Crown Brewing Corporation, a brewery company based in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Old Crown was sold to its employees a short time later.^[4]

In 1964, Chris-Craft launched the all-fiberglass Chris-Craft Commander. This dramatic new design was unveiled at the New York City National Boat show, perched at the top of an escalator on a giant, castered cradle. This first Commander was a 38' express hardtop with a 13' beam. The line of Commanders soon grew to include sizes ranging from 19' to 60'—all "styled in fiberglass."

In 1968, Baldwin-Montrose Chemical Co., Inc. took a controlling interest in Chris-Craft and installed its chairman, Herbert J. Siegel, as Chris-Craft's chairman.^[5]

Chris-Craft Industries formed BHC, Inc. to hold its two existing television stations, KCOP in Los Angeles and KPTV in Portland, Oregon, both placed within BHC's Chris-Craft Television, Inc. subsidiary. That same year, Chris-Craft purchased a share of 20th Century Fox. In 1981, the 20th Century Fox share, then at 20 percent, was traded for 19 percent of United Television.^[5]

Between the 1960s and 1980s, Chris-Craft lost market share as competitors with more innovative designs and less expensive manufacturing techniques such as fiberglass hulls came on the scene. Chris-Craft ended production of its last mahogany-hulled boat, the Constellation, in 1971.

Chris-Craft Industries sold its boat division to Murray Industries in 1981. Chris-Craft Industries retained the Chris-Craft trademark and licensed it to Murray.^[6] Outboard Marine Corporation acquired the company in 1989. OMC went into bankruptcy in 2000 and was purchased by Genmar. Genmar sold the Chris-Craft division to Stellican, Ltd., then Stellican purchased the Chris-Craft trademark from News Corporation thus reuniting the two parts of the company.^[7]

Chris-Craft Industries was acquired by News Corporation in 2000 for its television subsidiaries.^[8]

See also

• Chris-Craft - a company that reunited the brand with the manufacturing division.

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d} "Chris-Craft Industries, Inc. Company History". Funding Universe.com. http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/ChrisCraft-Industries-Inc-Company-History.html. Retrieved 21 March 2011. 
2. ^ Dunevant, Ronald L.. "KPTV Timeline". Yesterday's KPTV. Ronald L. Dunevant. http://kptv.home.comcast.net/~kptv/timeline/timeline.htm. Retrieved 23 March 2011. 
3. ^ "KCOP Studio". Seeing Stars: the Television Studios... http://www.seeing-stars.com/tvstudios/KCOP.shtml. Retrieved 23 March 2011. 
4. ^ "A Brief History of Brewing in Fort Wayne, Indiana". Indiana Brewing History. http://www.indianabeer.com/History/IH-FW.html. Retrieved 23 March 2011. 
5. ^ ^{a b} "BHC Communications, Inc. Companies History" (html). Company Histories. Funding Universe. 1997. http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/BHC-Communications-Inc-Company-History.html. Retrieved 2009-07-20. 
6. ^ "Everything Old Is New Again: The New Chris Craft" (html). boat digest.com. Force 12 Media, LLC. January 7, 2007. http://www.boatdigest.com/node/151. Retrieved 2009-07-20. ^{[dead link]}
7. ^ "Everything Old Is New Again: The New Chris Craft" (html). boat digest.com. Force 12 Media, LLC. January 7, 2007. http://www.boatdigest.com/node/151. Retrieved 2009-07-20. 
8. ^ Wootliff, Benjamin (14 Aug 2000). "News Corp's $3.7bn for American TV stations". The Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/4461864/News-Corps-3.7bn-for-American-TV-stations.html. Retrieved 21 March 2011.