Word: balish
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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When he was 13, Benjamin Balish had saved $5,300 from peddling spoiled pineapples to slum dwellers on Manhattan's lower East Side. Then he turned to onions, at one time was making about $175,000 a year as active partner in Dingfelder & Balish, Manhattan onion and potato jobbing firm. Claiming he was U. S. "Onion King," Ben Balish last year bought out his partner, quiet, wealthy Carl I. Dingfelder (TIME, Oct. 18). Last fortnight, the 42-year-old Onion King declared himself broke, asked permission to reorganize Benjamin Balish Co., Inc. under Section 776 of the Federal Bankruptcy...
Explanations of the King's downfall were as numerous as his enemies. The trade believed, however, that King Balish had been living too lavishly, had extended himself too far last year in buying Partner Dingfelder's interest, had plunged too heavily on several bad deals since 1929. In filing for bankruptcy, the Onion King listed liabilities of $150,970, assets of $414,576. Among the latter were $160,000 representing goodwill and value of the firm's brand, $42,000 listed as "advance to Ben Balish...
...Next Balish partner was Abraham Rosenblum, "Onion King" in 1918 when young Ben went to work for him. Three years later, having saved $35,000, Onionman Balish joined forces with a rich 50-year-old produce jobber named Carl I. Dingfelder. Dingfelder put up most of the money, Balish the onion experience, and by 1923 Dingfelder & Balish were tops in onion jobbing...
When the tariff on importing Spanish onions, which had been a large portion of their business, grew prohibitive, Dingfelder & Balish pioneered in importing Spanish onionseed; U. S. production of Spanish onions, which are the choicest of all, in 1921 was only 500 carloads. This year it is about 12,000. Total U. S. onion production last year was 70,000 carloads, of which Dingfelder & Balish handled more than any other firm. Also interested in potatoes, they had gross sales of $5,000,000. Last month after some disagreements Onion King Balish bought out his partner. Last week the new firm...
Onion King Balish is now president of the National Onion Association and chairman of a committee "to Lift the Onion Eater from the Category of Social Lepers." Owning his own company almost entirely, he lives prosperously with his wife in a colonial house at Manhattan Beach, is particularly proud of a swimming pool, a tennis court, a lavish doll house he has built for his four children. Says he: "I give them everything I didn...