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Today in Entrepreneurial History: August 13

By on August 13, 2012 in History

On this day in 2008 – Jack Weil died.

Jack Arnold Weil (March 28, 1901 – August 13, 2008) was the founder and CEO of the Denver-based Western clothing manufacturer Rockmount Ranch Wear and was believed to be the oldest working CEO in the United States.

Mr. Weil reckoned that a cowboy on a horse, if wearing a shirt with buttons, was liable to get snagged on sagebrush or cactus or, worse than that, get a steerhorn straight through his fancy buttonhole. He was pretty certain, too, that a cowboy losing a button would feel disinclined to sew it on again. The answer to all those difficulties was to make shirts with snap-fasteners. And for 62 years, in a red brick warehouse in the LoDo district of Denver, Mr. Weil did exactly that.

He also added a few more customizing. Pockets with sawtooth flaps, to keep tobacco in; a yoke fit, to broaden out the shoulders; body-hugging seams, to show the fine muscles of a cattleman; and deep cuffs. The hats, belts, buckles and bolo ties, which he also commercialized, were optional. But the snap-fasteners were de rigueur, topped with pearl and backed with tin, square or circular or diamond-shaped, strong enough to pass without cracking through the wringer of a 1940s washing machine, and flash enough to turn heads on the streets of Denver on a Saturday night. A cinch, as Mr. Weil proudly said.

He claimed to have quit smoking at age 60, drinking at age 90 and eating red meat at 100. However, Weil said he had a shot of Jack Daniel’s twice a week for “medicinal purposes,” specifically, to keep his blood thin.

In the book Ask Papa Jack:: Wisdom of the World’s Oldest CEO, grandson and current CEO of Rockmount, Steven Weil, shares heartwarming and down-to-earth anecdotes, stories, and Papa-isms, that are at once encouraging, honest, and insightful about the man who worked everyday of his life until he died at the age of 107.

Business Opportunities Weblog editor and publisher Dane Carlson lives in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, just 15 miles from Yosemite National Park. He accidentally became a professional blogger in 2001. He has added 12,198 posts to the site.

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