A SPECIAL HERO OF THE DAY!
Name: Floyd Bloss
Age: was 93
Occupation: entrepreneur
Last Seen: up in the heavens
Awarded For: being one smart businessman
Age: was 93
Occupation: entrepreneur
Last Seen: up in the heavens
Awarded For: being one smart businessman
----
On Sunday morning, one of the shows I enjoy is NBC's Sunday Today with Willie Geist. Towards the end of the show, he has a segment called "A Life Well Lived", which honors a person who passed away recently who accomplished positivity in their lives. Usually, that person was a war hero, or an inventor or somebody who made people's lives better.
Of course, I would never expect Floyd Bloss to be mentioned on that segment.
Bloss died last month at the age of 93 from dementia. When he died, he was given no media attention. His obituary, which is on his funeral home's website talks about him being married to his now-late wife, Lyla. It also mentioned his years of service with the military and the fact that he outlived his three children.
The obit talked about the fact that he had "successful businesses in Hawaii, Las Vegas and Michigan." What it didn't mention was what the businesses were. They were movie theaters.
Since the first movie theater opened nearly 130 years ago, they've brought lots of love, laughter and joy to millions of people around the world. But, they've had their challenges, especially in the financial sector. In the late 1920s, theaters had to convert to sound. In the 1950s, they have to widen their screens for Cinemascope. Just a few short years ago, they all had to go digital or else the studios would not send them the latest movies.
Back in the 1950s, the cinema world had a monster of a challenge: television. Throughout the decade, scores of movie theaters big and small shuttered because their once loyal patrons were staying home to watch Lucille Ball and Milton Berle. Here in west Michigan, a lot of neighborhood cinemas thought they had run their last reel of film. But then, Floyd Bloss came to town.
In the 1960s, Bloss purchased some of these theaters and turned them around. He took risks and sacrifices and won. He made millions and his cinemas played to packed audiences.
One of his greatest achievements came in 1966 when a young man named Harry walked into his Eastown Theater in Battle Creek. He was just 23 and had a series of odd jobs beforehand. He reportedly didn't have a happy childhood. His father left him as a child and his mother remarried to a man whom he never got along with. His childhood home had no plumbing, either. He left home at 15 and worked odd jobs, doing everything from slaughtering chickens to packing cereal boxes. He was laid off from working on a railroad when he started working for Bloss. Eventually, Floyd became like the father Harry never had. It was so much so that the two became partners, with the two buying up more theaters.
By 1970, that poor kid from Battle Creek, Harry Mohney was worth $6 million all thanks to Floyd Bloss. A large part of it was because their cinemas didn't show family-friendly Disney movies nor Hollywood hits. They showed nudie flicks.
Eventually, Mohney bought out Bloss' shares of the company. This was mainly because in 1970, Floyd's 18-year-old daughter, Debbie was stabbed to death in the Easttown during a movie. Harry and Floyd were vacationing together in Las Vegas at the time when she died. Another reason for Floyd selling out to Harry was because throughout the 1960s, Bloss had many legal battles. Many of them regarded the fact that at the time, the religious nuts in west Michigan tried to shut him down. True, 1960s skin flicks were quite tame comparing to the porn produced today. But in the 1960s, big, bouncy bare breasts were enough for some locals to call for his theaters to shut down. But in a lot of cases, Bloss won simply because of his First Amendment rights.
After Bloss sold his empire to Mohney, he moved to Hawaii. Mohney himself expanded his output to more cinemas, peep shows and bookstores. Yes, he had his problems, including tax fraud that threw him in jail for three years in the 1990s. Not long before his imprisonment, Mohney's theater empire was crumbling thanks to the rise of VCRs. But he had an idea: convert them into full-nude strip clubs. Deja Vu was born.
Today, there's 168 Deja Vu clubs, which make over $400 million per year thanks to Mohney. Just think that if he didn't walk into Floyd Bloss' Eastown Theatre, men everywhere wouldn't get the lap dances they deserved. Naked women wouldn't get the confidence they want when men come to them with money because they yanked their clothes off for all to see. True, Floyd Bloss had his problems, but he paid the price so all men could have boners.
And that to me, is A Life Well Lived.
--
Got a Bee-otch to nominate? E-mail us @ chuck69dotcom@gmail.com. All suggestions (except for me) are welcome!
Bee-otch of the Day Archives can be seen on http://beeotchoftheday.blogspot.com
Bee-otch of the Day is a production of Chuck69.com, Grand Rapids' site for Stern, politics and more!
Bee-otch of the Day Archives can be seen on http://beeotchoftheday.blogspot.com
Bee-otch of the Day is a production of Chuck69.com, Grand Rapids' site for Stern, politics and more!
CHUCK69.COM IS ALWAYS ON!
No comments:
Post a Comment