Until a few years ago, Gen. William Lyon was a lunchtime mainstay at Newport Beach’s swank Pacific Club, the unofficial home of OC’s real estate community.
He could also do more casual fare; he was a regular at the Trabuco Oaks Steakhouse, known for its prime rib special, casual vibes and “a strict no-tie policy.”
It’s the latter restaurant where Business Journal Publisher Richard Reisman and Lyon broke bread in 1998, and patched up a previously icy relationship between the icon and our paper, following an article a few years prior concerning the builder and a loan default.
“Mr. Reisman, I never thought that we’d meet, unless on a battlefield,” Lyon said, not entirely joking.
The meeting (during a meet-and-greet for an up-and-coming law enforcement officer named Mike Carona) led to an expansive feature later that year (the headline: Lyon Untamed), and a quip Reisman still remembers, at a charity event he attended a few months later, held at Lyon’s Coto de Caza estate.
Told by an alarmed guest that “the press was here” at the private event, Lyon said loudly: “Mr. Reisman and I have buried the hatchet.”
Lyon was true to his word; the paper had an amicable, professional relationship since—through several market cycles, corporate ups and downs, and executive changes. His largest quibble with me took place more than a decade ago, concerning our estimate of his fortune, for our annual OC’s Wealthiest issue.
I’ll leave it to others to decide whether he said our estimate (now in the $1 billion range) was too high, or too low.
A considerable portion of Lyon’s fortune and time went to charity and community efforts. It’s unsurprising that our last big interview with the General took place about a decade ago, at the time of the Lyon Air Museum opening.
The 30,000-square-foot facility at John Wayne Airport combined Lyon’s passion for flying, interest in preserving the memory of those who served in WWII, and his support for youth education.
“I’ve always wanted to share this with children because these things fade away into our history,” Lyon told us.
He was also the leading benefactor to the Orangewood Foundation, a nonprofit that serves troubled children; see Bill H. Lyon’s Leader Board tribute on page 47 to learn how that support ended up being repaid in full.
The Business Journal is donating a portion of the proceeds from the numerous tribute ads to Lyon you’ll see in this and future editions to Orangewood. For more on the organization, visit www.orangewoodfoundation.org.
Christopher Trela’s front-page feature details myriad ways area restaurants are preparing to reopen, including the use of face shields, plexiglass barriers and spaced-out tables.
Not all restaurants are reinventing their operations. Near the entrance to the Balboa Peninsula, Chihuahua Cerveza’s flagship restaurant and taproom largely had a business-as-usual vibe and busy crowd over the Memorial Day weekend.
The attitude isn’t surprising, considering the Gary Jabara-funded business is selling “F COVID-19” T-shirts on its website. Profits from the shirt sales go to the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund (rerf.us).
Medical improvements aside, Chihuahua’s 64-ounce to-go growlers of beer, at $6 each, might be the best thing to come out of the pandemic.
