Jim Fitzgerald
Encyclopedia
James F. Fitzgerald is an American businessman
Businessperson
A businessperson is someone involved in a particular undertaking of activities for the purpose of generating revenue from a combination of human, financial, or physical capital. An entrepreneur is an example of a business person...

 and philanthropist
Philanthropy
Philanthropy etymologically means "the love of humanity"—love in the sense of caring for, nourishing, developing, or enhancing; humanity in the sense of "what it is to be human," or "human potential." In modern practical terms, it is "private initiatives for public good, focusing on quality of...

. He is best known as a former owner of the Milwaukee Bucks
Milwaukee Bucks
The Milwaukee Bucks are a professional basketball team based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. They are part of the Central Division of the Eastern Conference in the National Basketball Association . The team was founded in 1968 as an expansion team, and currently plays at the Bradley Center....

 and the Golden State Warriors
Golden State Warriors
The Golden State Warriors are an American professional basketball team based in Oakland, California. They are part of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association...

, both NBA
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...

 teams.

Early life

Fitzgerald is the son of Chloris (Ty) Beiter Fitzgerald and Michael H. Fitzgerald Jr. He graduated from high school on D-Day in 1944, and attended Baldwin-Wallace College
Baldwin-Wallace College
Baldwin–Wallace College is a liberal arts college in Berea, Ohio, founded in 1845. It is home to the Riemenschneider-Bach Institute and the Baldwin–Wallace Conservatory of Music, an internationally renowned music school. The college is affiliated with the United Methodist Church. Students receive a...

 in Berea, Ohio
Berea, Ohio
- History :The first European settlers were originally from Connecticut. Berea fell within Connecticut's Western Reserve and was surveyed and divided into townships and ranges by one Gideon Granger, a gentleman who served as Postmaster General under President Thomas Jefferson...

 and Notre Dame
University of Notre Dame
The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...

 (Class of 1947) in the V-12 Navy College Training Program
V-12 Navy College Training Program
The V-12 Navy College Training Program was designed to supplement the force of commissioned officers in the United States Navy during World War II...

, where he earned a degree in Naval Science. He also holds honorary Ph.D.
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...

s from the University of Wisconsin–Whitewater and Baldwin-Wallace College.

He married Marilyn Cullen of Janesville on August 1, 1950 at Notre Dame's Old College Chapel.

Fitzgerald was called for duty during the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

 in 1952 and spent time in the Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

 as paymaster
Paymaster
A paymaster often is, but is not required to be, a lawyer . When dealing with commission payments on contracts dealing with large amounts of money , most banks in the United States are very wary of handling such large amounts of money...

 on the USS Siboney (CVE-112)
USS Siboney (CVE-112)
USS Siboney was a of the United States Navy. She was the second ship named for Siboney, Cuba, the Cuban Village near which troops of Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders fought during the Spanish-American War....

. He was stationed in Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. With a population of 242,803 as of the 2010 Census, it is Virginia's second-largest city behind neighboring Virginia Beach....

.

Business accomplishments

After graduating cum laude from Notre Dame he briefly joined Standard Oil
Standard Oil
Standard Oil was a predominant American integrated oil producing, transporting, refining, and marketing company. Established in 1870 as a corporation in Ohio, it was the largest oil refiner in the world and operated as a major company trust and was one of the world's first and largest multinational...

. In 1948 he began his business career with a partner, Fred Weber. They became the Shell Oil
Shell Oil Company
Shell Oil Company is the United States-based subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, a multinational oil company of Anglo Dutch origins, which is amongst the largest oil companies in the world. Approximately 22,000 Shell employees are based in the U.S. The head office in the U.S. is in Houston, Texas...

 jobbers for Janesville, Wisconsin opening their first gas station on Parker Drive.

The business started by Fitzgerald and Weber grew quickly, adding gas stations and car washes. In the late 1950s, Fitzgerald began building shopping centers with his brother-in-law, J.P. Cullen. In the early 1960s, Fitzgerald built the first Holiday Inn
Holiday Inn
Holiday Inn is a brand of hotels, formally a economy motel chain, forming part of the British InterContinental Hotels Group . It is one of the world's largest hotel chains with 238,440 bedrooms and 1,301 hotels globally. There are currently 5 hotels in the pipeline...

 in Janesville with other investors, including Cullen and the Ryan brothers, both owners of regionally noted construction firms, and expanded to six other cities.

The Fitzgerald group later bought into banks and cable television
Cable television
Cable television is a system of providing television programs to consumers via radio frequency signals transmitted to televisions through coaxial cables or digital light pulses through fixed optical fibers located on the subscriber's property, much like the over-the-air method used in traditional...

 franchises in Janesville (Total TV, Inc.
Total TV, Inc.
Total TV Inc. was a regional cable television company started by Jim Fitzgerald in 1964. Fitzgerald, J.P. Cullen, the Ryan brothers and several other investors began the company because of the poor quality television signals in their hometown of Janesville, Wisconsin...

) and Madison, Wisconsin
Madison, Wisconsin
Madison is the capital of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....

. Eventually the cable operations were sold to Jones Intercable
JONES Intercable
Jones Intercable was a cable television company founded by Glenn Jones in 1970. Jones, already a cable television veteran, had bought his first cable system in Georgetown, Colorado after taking a $400 loan on his Volkswagen....

 (now part of Comcast
Comcast
Comcast Corporation is the largest cable operator, home Internet service provider, and fourth largest home telephone service provider in the United States, providing cable television, broadband Internet, and telephone service to both residential and commercial customers in 39 states and the...

) and TCI
Tele-Communications Inc.
Tele-Communications, Inc. or TCI was a cable television provider in the United States, for much of its history controlled by Bob Magness and John Malone....

.

In 1977, Fitzgerald led a group of investors in a takeover of Milwaukee Professional Sports and Service, Inc., the parent company of the Milwaukee Bucks.

In the early 1980s, Total TV expanded throughout Wisconsin to include 40 cities. The growth was driven by many new channels, including MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....

, CNN
CNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...

, USA Network
USA Network
USA Network is an American cable television channel launched in 1971. Once a minor player in basic cable, the network has steadily gained popularity because of breakout hits like Monk, Psych, Burn Notice, Royal Pains, Covert Affairs, White Collar, Monday Night RAW, Suits, and reruns of the various...

, ESPN
ESPN
Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, commonly known as ESPN, is an American global cable television network focusing on sports-related programming including live and pre-taped event telecasts, sports talk shows, and other original programming....

 and Showtime that were only available on cable.

About this time Fitzgerald became the head of the NBA
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...

's television committee. In addition to controlling the broadcast of NBA games on television, he was also in charge of investigating revenue opportunities in new technologies such as cable, satellite TV
Satellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...

 and high-definition television
High-definition television
High-definition television is video that has resolution substantially higher than that of traditional television systems . HDTV has one or two million pixels per frame, roughly five times that of SD...

 (HDTV). Fitzgerald and Bud Selig
Bud Selig
Allan Huber "Bud" Selig is the ninth and current Commissioner of Major League Baseball, having served in that capacity since 1992 as the acting commissioner, and as the official commissioner since 1998...

 (former owner of the Milwaukee Brewers
Milwaukee Brewers
The Milwaukee Brewers are a professional baseball team based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, currently playing in the Central Division of Major League Baseball's National League...

) founded the Sportsvue cable channel, a pay-per-view
Pay-per-view
Pay-per-view provides a service by which a television audience can purchase events to view via private telecast. The broadcaster shows the event at the same time to everyone ordering it...

 sports broadcaster in Milwaukee
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee is the largest city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin, the 28th most populous city in the United States and 39th most populous region in the United States. It is the county seat of Milwaukee County and is located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. According to 2010 census data, the...

. Sportsvue carried Bucks and Brewers games to fans throughout Wisconsin.

Sports involvement

Fitzgerald was chairman of the Bucks until 1985, when the team was sold to Herb Kohl
Herb Kohl
Herbert H. "Herb" Kohl is the senior U.S. Senator from Wisconsin and a member of the Democratic Party. He is also a philanthropist and the owner of the Milwaukee Bucks National Basketball Association team...

, now a U.S. Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

. In 1986, Fitzgerald and friend Dan Finnane, who had also been involved with the Bucks, took over the Golden State Warriors
Golden State Warriors
The Golden State Warriors are an American professional basketball team based in Oakland, California. They are part of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association...

, which he owned through 1995. Current owner Chris Cohan won control of the organization in a lawsuit, purchasing control from Finnane and Fitzgerald for the then-surprising price of $146 million. During his ownership of both teams, Fitzgerald had a "handshake agreement" with coach Don Nelson
Don Nelson
Donald Arvid "Don" Nelson is a former NBA player and head coach. He coached the Milwaukee Bucks, the New York Knicks, the Dallas Mavericks, and the Golden State Warriors....

, not a contract. This arrangement reflected the friendship and trust between them. Nelson was raised on a farm in Iowa. Fitzgerald spent his boyhood summers in Carroll, Iowa
Carroll, Iowa
-2010 census:The 2010 census recorded a population of 10,103 in the city, with a population density of . There were 4,698 housing units, of which 4,357 were occupied....

. In an era of lawsuits and countersuits, this “contract” was unique in professional sports. They are best friends to this day.

In 1997, fifty years after he graduated, the Fitzgerald family donated the new sports and communications center press box at Notre Dame stadium. Still an avid fan, Fitzgerald attends almost every home game.

Later years

In the late 1990s, Fitzgerald was involved with SoftSpikes, a soft plastic replacement cleat for golf shoes. Because SoftSpikes cause less damage to fairways and greens they are now required on most U.S. golf courses. SoftSpikes was operated by Rob O'Loughlin, Fitzgerald's son-in-law.

Today, Fitzgerald is involved in several startup ventures, including LaserLink Golf, the manufacturer of a laser distance measuring device for golfers. It is also run by O'Loughlin.

Marilyn and Jim Fitzgerald have been married 61 years and have six children, more than a dozen grandchildren, six great-granddaughters, and two great-grandsons.
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