BILL BLEWS & MY BLUES (#83): After I left Wittner, I started work for William F. Blews, Esq. There couldn’t have been a more stark difference between Wittner and Bill. Bill was in every sense of the word a true gentleman. I would never want to go against him in court. He was tough, but honest and fair.
Bill had built a four story, 30,000 square foot office building, the Orange Park Center, on 1st Avenue North and 7th Street in downtown St. Petersburg. Orange Park Center was well designed and well built. I signed a 6 month Employment Agreement with Bill, something I wish I had done with Wittner. My duties were to secure tenants and oversee the tenant buildout of their office space.
Above all, what I liked was that things were peaceful. There was no drama and no need to decide if something was right or wrong, because Bill never put me in that position. Leasing went fairly well, and I even had the opportunity to design the office space. Some prospective tenants wanted to see how the office space would layout before they signed a lease and I told Bill I could do it. No need to pay for an architect until we need final plans for a building permit.
As was my nature, I did more than was asked, and eventually was helping Bill manage his law practice. I had agreed to provide my own computer, and I bought an IBM “Portable” for $2,000. The term “Portable was a joke, it was bigger that a sewing machine, but I could take it home to work on articles I was writing as a stringer/correspondent for the “Evening Independent” (See # 77).
I thought I was happy, but in going through my files I found two pages, written on my IBM, discussing depression. I remember that in one of the books I started, “Thirty Five”, I had killed off the hero the Monday after his 35th Birthday party. It was a true story based on me, except for the red Porshe the hero bought the week before his birthday. The fact that he took the Credit Life Insurance when buying the Porche, suggested that the fatal Monday morning crash wasn’t an accident.
On reflection, these were clues that I should have stayed with Bill. I would have had the time to focus on my marriage and be there for Linda after the Park Bank disaster. We had enough money, even with the bad real estate investments, Wittner center Crossroads and an orange grove with my uncle. We eventually lost nearly $30,000 on those. We still had a two bedroom condo across the street and could use the pool, plus we had a duplex on St. Pete Beach.
Then the most bizarre thing I could imagine happened. I was offered the job as the Executive Director of the Salvador Dali Museum. I had no art background, except I did have a small collection of 20 originals by friends and local artists.
The Dali Museum was the first art museum I had been to as an adult, but I loved it. On the first anniversary of the Museum, the Order of Salvador held a benefit dinner, served in the Museum’s Main gallery. Wittner bought a table for eight, and as was his custom invited VIPs to sit with him. At the last minute, he had two tickets left. I owned a Tuxedo, so Linda and I filled out the table.
If you were never in the original Museum, I can’t do justice to that evening. We took a glass of wine and started strolling to the left as you walked into the Gallery. All the paintings, except the large Master Works, were arranged in chronological order. The perfect way to view Dali’s work. Starting with his works as a student and quickly proceeding to to the exquisite “Basket of Bread” and “Girl’s Back” painted in 1926 when Dali was only 22 years old. Then on to his Surrealist works that were mean to shock and hopefully change one’s perception of reality. As I watched the progression, I understood what Dali was trying to accomplish, and he certainly pulled it off!
The Master Works were so large that the floor at the end of the Museum had been lowered 4 feet to accommodate them. We walked down the ramp into the “pit”. Take the “Hallucinogenic Toreador” for example. The painting is 13 feet tall and 10 feet wide. Most people have only seen an 81/2” X 10” picture and think of Dali’s work as crazy and crowded. Standing in front of it, the detail of each part is as fine as if you were looking at a separate painting. I had never even noticed the lady in the bikini on the yellow raft. Now there she was, painted perfectly. Step back and the concept is mind blowing.
We could stand in one large room, what had once been a warehouse, and merely by turning our heads see the works of a lifetime. Linda and I joined the Museum and returned for the Order of Salvador Dinner each year. Tickets were $150, and while I was at Wittner and Linda was at Park Bank, we could put the cost on our expense account. But after we left our previous employers, we paid for our own.
One night, Linda came home with news. First, she had been late to the meeting planning the next Order of Salvador dinner, and she had been elected Chairperson. Second, we wouldn’t have to pay for our tickets this year because they were complimentary for the Committee. I said I didn’t think that was right, the Committee should have to pay. Evidently Linda told Mr. Morse that “Scott” said the Committee should have to pay, and that stuck in his head.
The Order of Salvador dinner was a success, and to show their thanks to Committee members who had paid for their tickets that year, Eleanor and Reynolds Morse took the Committee and their spouses to dinner. They happened to choose the President’s Club. I sat next to Reynolds and told him that as the project coordinator for City Center, I had worked with Bud Chiles, son of Senator Lawton Chiles, and his partner on the design of the Presidents Club, and the Presidential Inn, which they also operated.
Ren, as he wished to be called, was impressed. He also remembered that I was the one who suggested that committee members pay for their tickets to the dinner. The next day Ren called me and said he wanted to talk to me about working for the Museum. I was excited and made my first of many mistakes.
I called Jim Martin, one of the three community leaders responsible for bringing the Museum to St. Petersburg, and the Museum’s attorney. I asked Jim about Stu Smith, who was the Museum Director at the time, and told him that Reynolds Morse wanted to meet with me. As soon as Jim called Ren to say that was a good idea, things went into the deep freeze for three months. My good friend, Aaron Fodiman, always refers to me as the first Director of the Museum, but actually I was the third. Stu Smith had taken over from a city of St. Petersburg staff member, John Sellers.
Now that Ren was thinking of a new Director, I believe mainly because fund raising was not going well, who was he going to hire? He despised profession museum directors, partly as a result of his experience with the Cleveland Museum of Art. He also didn’t like local yokels. In his mind I was a local yokel who had gone behind his back to Jim Martin.
Eventually Stu Smith was gone. I feel sorry for what he must have gone through before he was out the door. My name was brought up again by Jim and some of the original board members. It was suggested that Ren and Eleanor should meet with Bill Blews to check me out.
I will never forget how gracious Bill was to Ren and Eleanor. He talked at length about the City of Cleveland, its history, what an important city it was, and how much he always enjoyed a visit to Cleveland. They hit it off tremendously. Bill told them how lucky he was to have found me, that I always did more than asked. He said he had hired me as a real estate broker to lease his office building, but as an attorney I was helping him manage his law practice. He added that one day he wanted me to help him with a few cases and then hopefully take some of my own.
After Ren and Eleanor left, Bill said, “Scott, if that is what you want I wish you the best. I can see where it could be appealing. I meant what I said. I want you to stay. If you do I will write you a check now for $5,000, yours to keep. If you are still here in a year, I’ll write you a check for another $5,000 and we’ll write a new agreement with a raise. Let me know what you decide.”
I of course, decided to take the job with the Salvador Dali Museum for less money. There was controversy and immense stress from the minute I walked in the door. It affected Linda, me, and Ren. By all accounts, I did an exceptional job. For some reason, Ren took this as a threat and made my life miserable.
I would still do it all over again. Ren was a brilliant man, the Dali art in the Museum is one of the best collections of art in the world, and the original Museum, while it had serious problems in the event of hurricanes, offered an opportunity to view the art in a setting that was unique.
William F. Blews, Esq. was elected President of the Florida Bar Association in December of 1992. By then, I was divorced, fired from the Dali Museum, had developed an undiagnosable inflammatory joint disease, and the SEC had shut down Seahawk Deep Ocean Technology. I’ll write about Seahawk soon in “Another Doomed Endeavor.” I took a job with the treasure hunting company in Tampa for less than half of what I was offered to run a charitable foundation in St. Petersburg. Not one of my better choices, but I wanted to get away from the pain in St. Petersburg, and I never worked in St. Petersburg again.
Such was my life, but all is well that ends in San Miguel de Allende!
