Broadcast live on cspan 2s were going to have time end to have a q a session so when the time comes, please like up at the microphone to your right so that our home viewing audience can hear the questions. With that, im going to hand it with that, im going to hand it over to your interviewer, amy carr, associate mapping are editor for the chicago tribune. [applause] welcome to lit fest. Im here pleased to be here with lisa napoli. Former journalist, current journalize. He man who made the mcdonalds fortune and the woman who gave it all wow. I love this title. Thick people dont often appreciate lounge it goes into getting a perfect title. I think this is a great headline. I grew up in new york which is the master of headlines but i got lucky. It is a book about that man who meat mcdonalds to what we know today and amazing, headspinning philanthropy of his third wife, joan kroc. When we were putting together the program, liz taylor, who is the chicago tribunes literary editor at large, was talking about it. Said should a Business Writer do this interview . And she said, its not a business book. Its a love story. And i think its a little more complex than that. It is a business story, love story, its a hate story, and it really is a story about mid20th century americana and that is what kept me going in the five years it took research because it blends everything together and makes luke odd something we take to for granted came to be and the, whichs and people behind it. Loved it as researcher because it did pull together so many things. As a former technology and business reporter, really if you think about it, paper cups, which ray kroc used to sell were hightech when he was selling them 100 years on and so on and so on, and the other great thing was it made my come to chicago quite a lot, because its such a distinctly Chicago Story and what a pleasure that was, even in the wintertime. In the wintertime. Host so you were a tech reporter, written for the new york times, got your start at cnn, right . So how did you stumble on to this tale . Guest people when first started working on, it people would say you dont seem like the typical mcdonalds customer. Why too you care about that . Whatever a typical mcdonalds customer is, and it turns out that it wasnt mcdonalds that got me interested in it. It was joans philanthropy, as you mixed before, more somebodily i was a public radio reporter for public Radio Station in santa monica, california, near where i live, and i went to cover the fate of this giant peace sculpture by the late editorial car couldntist, paul conrad, and it was weird to me this editorial cartoonist made the 26foot tall Mushroom Cloud out of chain link and it was in trouble. This city was going to knock it down because they didnt have the now restore it, and i said beneath is with my microphone, who built this in the first place . Why dont you just go to her . And jerry rubin, the paste activist, says we cant talk about. It was an anonymous gift but it was joan kroc who gave the gift. And he thought anybody who was in public radio would know and exalt kroc because she gave that massive gift when she died in 2003. And i thought, wow, want to read a book about this joan kroc. A peace activist who funded a sculpture nowhere near where she lived and gave all this now npr. What else is there about her . I started searching and i could find some obituaries but couldnt find a biography, so couldnt find a biography, so dumbly, stupidly, i appointed myself the person would do that and i found out quickly why one had never been written. Host the footnotes in this book you see how thick this book is. Theres 260 pages of 65 of tex and then another good chunk of footnotes and a really fascinating ledger of all of joans philanthropic givings. How many pages does that phonophore. How many pages does that go on were . We excerpteed it in book but on the web site we have the whole thing. Close to 20 pages of strange its sort of like a Rosetta Stone into their mind over the course of her life. Disparate and strange, evolving lot of money, from a little bit enormous sums of money she gave. So the footnotes i took pride in the footnotes. Someone asked me if i had so many footnotes to pad out the book which i thought was so silly. Anybody who reads buying a graphs knows i biographed. Happifully theyre fun to read. Host so, talk about the reporting process. When i saw the Salvation Army donation i thought there were was zeros. How much . Gl close to a billion. Host so, talk about the reporting process. Like you said, no one has done this storys it was very difficult, right . Theres all these she gave to so many people, and how did you tackle that . Guest it was hard them first place i started was mcdonalds, of course, near oakbrook and they would not help me. They said, oh, there are two books written about mcdonalds, one written by ray not really, he had a guest writer read those. Said, no, thats nice but i need to find out more. And they never helped me. The families of ray and joan, as union possessed it the third wife what was left of the families were reluctant to work with me. So it was hard, and what i found and what was so much fun in the Research Process you know this from your work also frustrating, too is just reverse engineering things. So, i started first i start extractioning things, obituaries, old archives go to the Harold Washington library in san diego because they lived out thunder lives in san diego. The Public Library there. In search of what is very hard to find because its not all digitized yet and its not all we all thing everything you go on the internet and just type in a search word ask ask you find everything but it doesnt work that way, especially when youre looking in the 60s, and 70s sunshine early 80s sway go to these places and sift through newspaper after newspaper and try to find names from the names of people i Found Associated with them, if they were still a live, sleuth them out. Paid visits to people in rapid city, south dakota. All over the country. Joan lived there as an early franchisee, st. Paul. And finding people it was a thrill of pursuit that we have in journalism because sometimes youre banging your head against the ball because waugh cant find a person but i loved when someone had an unusual name because it made it easier to find them. If i found out they were deceased i knew i found them using modern Research Tools like an ancestry or old date books and things like that. So, it was tough because there wasnt an archive. Joined Biographers International organization, an Amazing Group of biographers, for guidance, and i learned a lot going into their conferences and reading their newsletters their Pulitzer Prize winners who are experts in research and mining for information, but i learned very quickly that those tricks dont necessarily work when people havent left behind information and neither ray nor joan did. So thankfully rays brother ran the foundation, the first iteration from the kroc foundation, from a ranch in santa inez in california, called the j r double r ranch, and rays brother was the exact opposite of him and he was meticulous Record Keeper and knew he was doing michigan important with the early part of the Mcdonalds Corporation when mcdonalds went public. So there was this hardship assignment of going to the university of california san santa barbara, which has a beautiful Research Library and sifting through the papers and looking for clues, was both la borous and lab borous and also a joy when you found something. Im sorry for the long answer. Host lets talk about ray a bit. Theres a strong connection to chicago, living in oakbrook and mooing to the city and the home of mcdonalds number one. So, is it truly the first mcdonalds . Show less text 00 11 20 unidentified speaker guest it isnt. The first mcdonalds i late. The first mcdonalds i late the first mcdonalds i late to disappoint the chicagoans in the audience the first mcdonalds really was in san bernardino. Actually the first one was in Riverside County but riverside, california, and mcdonalds was started by two powers after world war ii who brothers are world war ii who were looking to make a buck. They were in the hot dog business and the Movie Theater business so they started this developed this system of preparation, food preparation. They were carhop restaurants and people were doing Quick Serve Food but werent doing as quick as the brothers invented. Ray was here as paper cup salesman who became a salesman of multispin tell milkshakemaker that derived from an early ice cream stand here calls prince castle. Some of the old timers may know it. And so from that office here in chicago he started selling these milk shake machine mixers and thats how me met the brothers mcdonald in san bernardino, california, and asked them if he could franchise the system, and they had had some early luck with franchising. They werent interested in going as big as ray wanted to because they knew how hard it would be, and the rest is out. It does so what happened here is when ray decided to franchise or was allowed to start franchising, he built his first mcdonalds in des plaines, and thats why its erroneously referred to as number one because for many years the Mcdonalds Corporation did not acknowledge these brothers existed and that there had been nine or ten actually haty interesting. Ten other restaurants and we think were mcdonalds number one. That was the way he did business and eventually the mcdonalds brothers were no longer involved. Right. Yeah. Ray met them in the mid50s. Started franchising and then it was in 1961 that he bought them out for 2. 7 million. The system was in a difficult place, mcdonalds could have very easily tanked, and the way they had to keep raising money, they had to buy out the brothers. The brothers were fed up with ray at that point, too because he was bombast and they were trying have this longdistance business relationship which is difficult enough today but then it was, they would carry around dictaphone machines and send each other tapes back and forth. The wantnt want to talk on the phone because they were always angry. Ray asked them what you want to go away. They said 2. 7 million and in 1961, the same year ray divorced his first wife, the brothers got this big check, and rode off into the sunset and really didnt get angry about it until years later when actually one of them did one of the brothers passed away but Dick Mcdonald got angry years later after ray kroc died in 1984 and mcdonalds was advertising like crazy that the founder has been deceased, and Dick Mcdonald said, no, we were the founders. He wasnt the founder and thats when there was a whole drama between mcdonalds and Dick Mcdonald and some wrongs were made right but some acknowledgments and that kind of thing, but it is an interesting 20th mid20th century business story that could happen today, invariably business parters have spat order breakups and people around the world study franchising and food service through the lens of mcdonalds and theres so much they get wrong. Host well, happened to turn into one of the Largest Companies in the world. Right . So, interesting you bring up the founder. So, much of what you just relayed was on the Silver Screen in the past year in a movie called the founder starring michael keaton. Your book wag not involved in the movie at off. You were not involved. Correct . Guest no. But much of the same topics are in there. How much were there things they didnt get right. Guest many things they took Poetic License with, but what is interesting for all the women and feminists in the audience, it was hard to sell a book just about joan, and when we learned about the movie being made by putting ray in the title and by acknowledging where the fastfood fortune came from, in a deeper way than initially i hoped to, that sold the book. So its interesting that host that is interesting. Guest made it more attract tonight to tell i think it is a better back to have told the story about where the fortune that joan gave away came from but it is interesting that even though joan alone is who is a great 20th century philanthropist wasnt a draw because she is as compelling as ray. Host maybe thats will by your movie. Guest anyone who wants to option the book her story is dynamite. She is such a strong, interesting woman, who came from nothing, but to your point incomes the founder and the People Associated with movie have been angry with me for saying best but the founder gets two main things wrong that stick in my craw and i have a whole whole list on my web site, rayinjoan. Com. The fact that the brothers were cheated out of a continued royalty from ray. They took their money and they went off. They were happy to have the money. They werent happy with ray. They didnt like him. A lot of people didnt like ray. But thats an assertion in the movie i have not been able to substantiate and ive worked very, very hard to make it make sure that what i am brighting in the book is correct. The other thing is how joan is depicted. She is depicted as the second wife, when really she is the third, and she is depicted as the wife of a very successful restaurant your when in fact she was pretty much the main support, financial support, for her first husband, rolly, by playing in an elegant restaurant, piano and organ and other jobs, and her husband, rolly, was hired by a franchiseee, an early franchisee to manage an early franchise in st. Louis park, minnesota, that joan was behind the scenes on, and so you really dont get a sense of how hard joan and her first husband really worked, and also in the movie they say that joan is certain of plot twist that convinces ray to use milk shake machine mix. Thats not true. And thats host instead of real ice cream. Guest its minutiae but important historically because it turns out i found this out i still hear from people who are mcdonalds historians so its that kind of information that is really key and critical, and joan really was so important behind the scenes in the early days of mcdonalds. She wasnt just a trophy wife, a beautiful, much younger wife. She was working the frenchfryer with her house who became an early franchisee. Host the movie she isnt portrayed as much the movie as much but theres the charming scene on the piano where their singing pennies from heaven. Thats the night the met. Tell the story how they met. Guest so, ray writes this in this out autobiography, grindening it out that ray was shopping around for franchisees around the midwest, and he went to st. Paul to the cite criterion restaurant, owned bay success entrepreneur in the area named jim zine and he walked in and there was jobe joan playing the organ and were not clear she played pennies from heaven. She was not a singer, never was, but ray walked in and was taken not just by what he said was her blond beauty but by her musical prowess because he, too was a musician. Joan played music early on, on television, live tv breaks back when there wasnt tape in television in the early day of that medium, but ray, who is 26 years older, played live on the radio here in oak park where he was from, where he was raised, at the oak park arms hotel, where there was a live orchestra ever night. So people would dance. That was radio back in the early days. He has this kinship with her that carried throughout their life about music, and i loved that united them. Host he was married to egg eggle, his first wife. Guest yes. Host and he goss sorted from ethel and then he and joan were not immediately together. Guest joan was not ready to marry him. There was an aborted attempt at marriage, and they finally d conveniently he married abe woman in the meantime because he could not handle being a bachelor. Win mcdonalds went public he bought a ranch he called the double large ranch and then going to the side that worked when he married joan for girl there are a lot of stories in the book so sharese the story and set the scene for where they were headed to a jet set to have a pretty good time before that. When mcdonalds went public he was doing well in a different points in his career. Is so he was older and his second wife bought the ranch running all over the country is to go off on the fifth anniversary on a cruise with the re had his lawyer delivered baboons the lawyer said i am very sorry that he is leaving you and here is a we will give you and i hope that is okay because if not not, too bad that is the deal. Apparently she burst into tears and that is how she learned that the marriage was over and he ran off to and joan to vegas and then they got married not longep after at the double r ranch. That says a lot about who he was the use the delivery of bad news in that is something joe myrtle so whatt good is it to have people if they dont tell your bad news. [laughter] so lets talk about theti connection into chicago soldmare highlight a few of these significant landmarks. And with East Fairview in Arlington Heights when they were first able to buy a home but that is where he had his office first in then he took over the ofmcdona Mcdonalds Corporation he kept getting more and more office space but the hotel is where he went he kicked him out of the house and between the marriages where he would hang out and drink and drink and drink quite a lot. Y north lakeshore . That is another area they show in the movie. E ray and that is where they live with the first got married in the duplex apartment in that beautiful apartment and had that retrofitted and had beautiful parties there. But the Community Center . Ltd. She left 2 billion to the Salvation Army but before she died she built a Community Center in san diego is a poor neighborhood the story is that she put she founded and 80 million Recreation Center and in her will she was the Salvation Army to replicate that center wherever they could and what is your of the south side of chicago. You have got to see it. Theyre all spectacular stated the art facilities. As Recreation Centers. So is the only gift she leftt posthumously that has her name in it. As a baseball fran wood negative van and a cubs fan since then i should own the cubs . It didnt. So he heard a news story both ray and jonah were fake news junkies that day per the deal that the cn diego padres was going to fall b through. They were a lousy team but he heard they were available so he put down 10 million that changed their lives because now theyre at the center of their lives in sanwn diego it took joan a few years. But now owe their rich mans plaything. He was just happy to be in baseball. His first night as the owner . The first night they played their home game, ray was city probably in the odors fox giddy more and more in since how terrible the game was going. At a certain point he went to the announcer ruth asked if he could say a few words to the people. It was a sellout crowd. He was the hero for the he said i have never seen such lousy ball playing in my life. I imagine that in the age of twitter. But it took awhile for that comment to reverberateas because at that exact moment some person ran across the outfield, a streaker and it was a crazy night and it set the stage only that he was bombastic but now that wasw the big welcome to send diego and Major League Baseball bader people were not very happy about it. S dollar so as you mentioned he was bombastic a and a bit of a drinker than that judge ito on their marriage so all this time but it was not quite so rosy . Any time i hit a wall in my research i went back to the revelation to the Cook County Court house was the divorce papers of ray and ethel on the papers of the divorce rate filed herselfally t after they got married but joe was so troubled by his alcoholism in now what we would call a functional alcoholic. He could drink all night long been be up to zero hours later delivering a speech at a convention. And before we had language talking about addictionism, e especially in Place Society so joan was so fed up and this is her i learned why mcdonalds was not eager to help me so she decided she would convene all the people in the early Addiction Treatment movement that was just burgeoning and Alcoholics Anonymous existed but not a Huge Industry in with the acknowledgment. In with that meeting of the of mines and came up with an action plan of things they could do to get the word out to the general public of alcoholism as a diseased and impacted the entire family. She only had a highschool education and not a social worker but did not have the framework for the wisdom herself to gather these folks and from there took them to raise money that was earmarked for philanthropy to tell her brotherinlaw she was starting this operation that is kroc spelled backwards which is a little too cute for alcoholism but this is all on education and the impact on the of family at the time when they did not have that conversation. That is what made me fall in love with her that she persevered, she could haveve left and of course, day and took a lot of money bet instead she stayed in some said she stayed because she would inherit the money and then did a lot of good with his money but shes rarely just wrote the check to be very active and handson and to come out in the press of the wife of a very wealthy man committed to a cause and it wanted to know why are you so interested in this subject . But she protected ray and tell he was gone but she was committed to this important work. And that is when she really started to come into her own. Ublic and not involved in the business to get her some pet projects so she got a taste of it . And she saw the power parker she was daunted by people in her family how much money there was especially once he died. And then to have that responsibility the gates and better tremendous people but to give that life worth whatever it is is tremendous but before any of that happens joan had done that. To g still the fact she proceeded to fall in love to be philanthropic when we see somebody with less than what we have. D in a that was the incredible way. Did with. [laughter] list compiled so since the book came now to underwrite that free Dental Clinic in the port area of san diego anybody that walked in there got dental care for free. There are so many things that they dont know about and it is hard to know that m monetize but she had about 3 billion at the end of her life that was after a lifetime of giving and she gave away almost 90 percent of that. There were so many different causes. So some causes she was passionate about and those that would not be the recipient and that is to day chose. To like un trust you if you were doing something cool. Ray and her father both have hospice care with a contemporary and hospice movement. No and now again it is that we take for granted our culture. And add a woman that was committed to building a Free Standing hospice and joan was very impressed and wrote her a check and made it happen so time and againfreest there was that time up the kind of philanthropy that in addition into alcoholism advocate later became a peace advocate. Ect and and then just in case and then went up to him after words but then she said i would like to help you he said who are you . And was not so well known at that point then the next the new notes she visits the campus and gives a lot of money to build and sustain as the peace is to endeavor to dave. In to say you are doing something very cool. What do i have to do to make it happen . [laughter]o. But it is such a dream to be able to do that. So to focus entirely should focus on baseball. But that is like baseball belong to the people. Even k why would you want to buy awa monastery . She went from not knowing what that was like to do her crocheted to t falling in love with it but it is an incredible year for her and the padres did wellow and how passionate people were said to give that to the people of san diego that was responsible and sustainable that would have meant that would be public and they didnt want that type of scenario because she decided in she was done with the ranch she wanted to give away to a Ronald Mcdonaldho house and the community her would not let her. We have not even talked about the Ronald Mcdonald house. How did that get started . It actually did not guess started because of video then they all contributed but one franchisee had someone come to him that they needed to raise moneyey to help people who could not stay in a hotel so either philadelphia or pittsburgh but not through mcdonalds corporate and when he turned 75 what you buy a billionaire . Everybody in his inner circle was enormously rich shifted money to start the seed fund so other mcdonalds regional franchisees could start their own version of Ronald Mcdonald house in their various communities and joan gave them a lot of money over the course of her l lifetime. Although not all of it which is controversial. Of course the charity itself it is controversial anybody that has benefited from it says so if you can see the work that they do this some take issue with the factact that that there is a Charitable Organization with a corporate mascot in the menendez day different conversation but that is a fallacy that mcdonaldsed started it. So it is not surprising. She gave a lot of money to the opera in san diego even though she hated the opera. Should like the people behind it and started the important Cultural Institution as they were both musicians and they would have great parties stand have tony bennett would come play but of. Was not her a thing and i have told at one point she went and went to though ladies after is started in said i will give you another Million Dollars if i can leave. [laughter] whats a ladies. Shall we take questions from the audience . There is a microphone over here. Shout out to rapid city south dakota. There were so many wonderful people in rapid city there is a throwaway line aboutis mcdonalds called behind the charges written 1986 with the help of mcdonalds there is a linene about joan as the earlyyher franchisee in rapid city. So i started to go to rapid city and finding people of us certain age through the historical society. One woman helped me figure out where the people were who knew them then. Were their royalty agreements . Thats why the movie was inaccurate. The buyout terminated the royalty agreement. The same wife i bought your house and wanted to borrow the bathroom you would have to let me in afterwards. They bought them out fair and square and that was the end of their business relationship. Ray did something super nasty on top of it but part of the equation was he said the brothers couldnt keep operating their original restaurant because he bought out the trademark. He bought out mcdonalds. He wanted that original restaurant and the brothers had to set up shop, im sorry ray got that mcdonalds and then the brothers had to set up shop elsewhere. The other way around, sorry im mixing it up. Anyway push them out ultimately the business that they sold out so its hard for us to fathom and its not as. Did joan continue to receive royalties and if so what would the royalties have netted them and their family . Neither of them had children at the time. He married a man later in a life who have the woman who had sons who had grandsons. I never looked at it but if i would have stayed at the news york times how much would my stocks have been worth, i didnt look at that. The brothers wanted out from ray and ray wanted out from the brothers. It was just typical breakup and ray said what is it going to take to make you walk away and the brothers got back right away and said name your price. They were not budging on the price and they said if he you cant come up with this money of stick around but ray knew if they had this early contract from the very beginning and harrys involvement with the company. They had to continue it was an albatross with the brothers and they didnt want that agreement. They could have have that agreement if they were to go out and keep borrowing money and ultimately filed for an initial public offering. My pleasure. I give much more detail about in the book. Harry got up big chunk of the money for all the ideas he brought to the table. In the early days ray was very generous with that stock because he said it was not worth anything. The Chicago Transit Authority token was worth more money but he gave carried 20 of the stock and he gave his longtime secretary, who was much more than secretary. She kept the books to, 10 of the stock so when the company went public they had given away more stock to these banks but they still made quite a lot of money. In your work do you talk much about raise relationship i do write about it in the book and you know what unfortunately wasnt as detailed a relationship that is a thought or hoped it would be. Turns out president nixon was supportive of ray who was one of the most famous businessman in the country at the time and certainly one of the wealthiest and notorious because mcdonalds was coming under fire for environmental and nutritional scourge that the food had become once it went more package than it had been in the early days. Ray famously gave 250,000 other gifts to the president , which branded him as a republican supporter. He was republican and he was a conservative but he was not an active politician like the Koch Brothers, i mean an active supporter of politicians the way the Koch Brothers might be or others so yes i do talk about that in the book. Interestingly jones was on the complete other end of the political spectrum. In fact was a big supporter of Walter Mondale when he ran for office and she classified herself as an independent. Ray called her a patsy. He felt that she was way too leftwing for his tastes. She was smart enough to keep the tour itself while he was alive but the minute he died she let it all hang out and thats when she became a major peace activists. I write in the book about Norman Cousins, you rate may remember the saturday review editor who was quite as ray would call it bleeding heart. An old mcdonalds executive who i interviewed for this book just by the concept of Norman Cousins and the antithesis of a hard driving hard drinking businessman but thats the interesting part. Thats what i find so fascinating about this story. They were very similar in some ways but they were so different in others and in politics not the least. Thank you. Thank you. Thats a great question. I think we will wrap up if there were no other questions. So you will be signing books, correct . There are many more stories where this came from. Lisa will be available to sign books so thank you all and i hope you had a great day and come back tomorrow again. [applause] thanks once again for everyone for attending. The books will be sold and signed right outside of the auditorium