Skip to main content

Advertisement

Advertisement

‘World’s grumpiest boss’ Edward Davis dies at 85

NEW YORK – “There will be no more birthday celebrations, birthday cakes, levity or celebrations of any kind within the office,” the boss wrote on Feb 8, 1978. “This is a business office. If you have to celebrate, do it after office hours on your own time.”

NEW YORK – “There will be no more birthday celebrations, birthday cakes, levity or celebrations of any kind within the office,” the boss wrote on Feb 8, 1978. “This is a business office. If you have to celebrate, do it after office hours on your own time.”

The employees of Tiger Oil Co probably were not surprised. They had seen worse. “Do not speak to me when you see me,” the man had ordered in a memo the month before. “If I want to speak to you, I will do so. I want to save my throat. I don’t want to ruin it by saying hello to all of you.”

The boss was Edward Mike Davis, otherwise known, tellingly, as Tiger Mike. A former chauffeur, he had become a Houston oil and gas magnate. But he earned an even greater measure of notoriety as the author of blunt and widely circulated office memos that earned him the unofficial title “world’s grumpiest boss”.

Davis died at 85 on Sept 18 at his home in Las Vegas. His death was confirmed by Mathew Goolsby, a longtime friend and business associate, who said the cause was complications of prostate cancer.

Embed from Getty Images

 

Tiger Oil filed for bankruptcy in the 1980s, but decades later it made news again when Davis’ memos started showing up on the Internet, notably on the website Letters of Note. The site’s founder, Mr Shaun Usher, declined to identify the oil industry source who made him aware of the memos in 2010 or so, but with Davis’ permission he has included them in a new book, Letters of Note: Volume 2 (2016).

“I wanted to put him in the first book,” Mr Usher said Saturday in a phone interview from his home in Manchester, England. “But his first response was just literally: ‘Not interested. Thanks.’ But I kept trying.”

After Davis saw a copy of that book (Letters of Note, 2013), which included correspondence by the likes of Katharine Hepburn, Mick Jagger and Galileo, he reconsidered. He wrote a letter, asking: “Are the same kinds of celebrities going to be in your second book?” Mr Usher responded by mentioning a few: Winston Churchill, Beatrix Potter, Richard Burton. And that was enough to persuade Davis; he even volunteered to send a photo.

“He wasn’t embarrassed” by the contents of the memos, Mr Usher recalled.

As a manager, Davis appeared to be concerned about the dress code (“On days you have to work, and you think you should be off, you wear slouchy dress attire,” he complained), idle conversation (“Do your jobs and keep your mouth shut!” he once wrote, in all capital letters) and office furniture (“I am paying you to work — not slouch in your chair with your feet up on a desk or table.”).

Davis had gone into the oil business with money from a divorce settlement. In the 1950s he worked as a chauffeur for Helen Gilmer Bonfils, the fashionable Denver Post heiress and owner, one of the most powerful women in Colorado. In 1959, when she was 69 and he was 28, they married, although he was, as The Post once reported, “a pugnacious and profane high school dropout”.

Their marriage lasted until 1971, and according to Papa’s Girl, a 2007 biography of Bonfils by Eva Hodges Watt, the couple were happier than some people had predicted. “She loved the fact that Mike had enough guts to behave outrageously,” a family friend was quoted as saying.

Davis’ most recent moment in the business spotlight was in 2012, when the billionaire Kirk Kerkorian and his Tracinda Corp settled (for undisclosed terms) a lawsuit against him for fraud. It was reported that Davis had deceived Kerkorian into investing in Delta Petroleum Co, which soon failed, and that Davis had received a US$5 million (S$6.8 million) finder’s fee in Delta stock for arranging the deal.

Edward Michael Davis was born on March 1, 1931, although exactly where and to whom has been a matter of speculation. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported that his birthplace was the Rosebud (Sioux) reservation in South Dakota, that he had served in the Army, and that both his parents and all six of his siblings had died.

He was the longtime partner of Phyllis McGuire, the youngest of the McGuire Sisters, the midcentury pop-singing trio. Last month he talked to The Las Vegas Sun about helping her put her Las Vegas mansion, complete with an indoor Eiffel Tower replica, on the market.

Posting on social media, old friends and colleagues agreed that Davis had been difficult to work for, but they found redeeming qualities. On Facebook, one consultant wrote, “I remember the first time I was cussed out by him”; a former employee saluted him as “truly one of a kind”; and a colleague hailed him as “one of the last of the great oil field wildcatters.”

Here are excerpts from Edward Mike Davis’ memos:

On notes that weren’t typed: “Handwriting takes much longer than a typewriter. You’re wasting your time, but more importantly, you’re wasting my time. If you don’t know how to type, you’d better learn.”

On running out for cigarettes: “I suggest that you people buy enough cigarettes to keep here for yourselves to smoke because, by God, you will not go and buy them on my time.”

On taking things from his desk: “I do not appreciate people coming into my office and helping themselves to my candy, cigars, medicine and other personal items ... I don’t mind giving, but I would like the privilege of knowing and giving it myself.”

On hippie-style long hair: “Anyone who lets their hair grow below their ears to where I can’t see their ears means they don’t wash. If they don’t wash, they stink. And if they stink, I don’t want the son-of-a-bitch around me.”

On language: “I swear, but since I am the owner of this company, that is my privilege, and this privilege is not to be interpreted as the same for any employee. That differentiates me from you, and I want to keep it that way. There will be absolutely no swearing, by any employee, male or female, in this office, ever.” THE NEW YORK TIMES

Read more of the latest in

Advertisement

Advertisement

Stay in the know. Anytime. Anywhere.

Subscribe to get daily news updates, insights and must reads delivered straight to your inbox.

By clicking subscribe, I agree for my personal data to be used to send me TODAY newsletters, promotional offers and for research and analysis.