Red McCombs

Red McCombs Biography

Billy Joe "Red" McCombs (born 1927) is the founder of the Red McCombs Automotive Group in San Antonio, Texas, a co-founder of Clear Channel Communications, Chairman of Academi (formally Blackwater Worldwide), a former owner of the San Antonio Spurs, Denver Nuggets, and the Minnesota Vikings, and the namesake of the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin. He was named one of Forbes magazine's top 400 richest Americans in 2005.

In 2012, the San Antonio Express-News reported McCombs' net worth at $1.4 billion. He was ranked the 913th richest man in the world. Two other San Antonio men, Charles Butt of the H-E-B supermarket chain and Rodney Lewis, a natural gas driller, were placed above McCombs on the list.

Biography

McCombs was born in 1927 in Spur, Texas. His nickname "Red" comes from his hair color. He briefly attended Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, where he played football (lineman and receiver) before serving in the United States Army in 1946 and 1947. After completing his Army stint, McCombs enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin, attending the business school and law school. While at the University of Texas, McCombs was a member of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity. He married his wife, the former Charline Hamblin in 1950. In the early 1950s, McCombs sold cars at George Jones Ford in Corpus Christi, leaving college to do so. In 1958, he and his fellow salesman, Austin Hemphill, moved to San Antonio to create Hemphill-McCombs Ford, which was the foundation for what ultimately became the Red McCombs Automotive Group.

McCombs entered the energy industry in the 1960s, resulting in the Houston-based McCombs Energy. He has also been involved in real-estate through the Koontz-McCombs development company. In 1972, McCombs partnered with Lowry Mays to purchase WOAI radio in San Antonio. The station was the launching point for Clear Channel Communications.

He has previously served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees at Southwestern University and Chairman of the University of Texas's M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. The business school at the University of Texas was renamed the Red McCombs School of Business in recognition of a fifty-million-dollar donation to the university.

McCombs is the recipient of the Texas Legend Award from the Texas Automobile Dealers Association and the Living Legend award from the New Braunfels Chamber of Commerce. He has also been honored by the American Academy of Achievement, San Antonio Business Hall of Fame, San Antonio Sports Hall of Fame, Texas Business Hall of Fame, and the College Football Hall of Fame. He has received honorary degrees from Southwestern University, the University of Texas at San Antonio, and Texas Lutheran University. He also sits in the board of eCommerce firm Cinsay Inc..

He is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Academi.

Sports ownership

McCombs' first entry into sports came in 1972, when he joined Angelo Drossos and several other San Antonio businessmen in leasing the struggling Dallas Chaparrals of the American Basketball Association and moving them to San Antonio as the Spurs. The Spurs proved to be a runaway hit, leading Drossos and McCombs to tear up the lease agreement and buy the team outright after only one year.

Two years after taking the Spurs into the NBA, McCombs sold off his stake in the Spurs and bought another former ABA team, the Denver Nuggets. He held onto the team until 1985. In 1988, he bought controlling interest in the Spurs from Drossos, selling them to current owner Peter Holt in 1993.

In 1998, McCombs bought the Minnesota Vikings for US$250 million. After an unsuccessful attempt to replace the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, McCombs sold the team to new (and current) owner Zygi Wilf before the 2005 football season.

McCombs was also actively involved in thoroughbred racing and breeding for many years as a major partner in Walmac Farm, a leading American breeding farm, in Lexington, Kentucky.

Controversy

McCombs is also noted for his development plans at Wolf Creek ski area in southern Colorado. The planned resort has drawn opposition from environmentalists. McCombs has been unsuccessful in his attempts to sway the United States Forest Service to permit the development to get started. McCombs then attempted to build a casino resort at Navajo Canyon on Lake Powell. The local Navajo Nation chapters, local government officials, all unanimously rejected the casino proposal and any projects by Red McCombs.

Formula One

On July 27, 2010, McCombs announced his financial backing for bringing Formula One to Austin, Texas. A new Formula 1 track was built in southeastern Travis County to host the event under a ten-year contract from 2012 to 2021. The first Formula One Race was held on November 18, 2012 and was won by Briton Lewis Hamilton.