Sorting Out the Financial Mess : ‘Big Daddy’ Unruh: He’s Gone but Not Forgotten

He could control people with his presence. Part of it was his size and reputation. “Big Daddy” was his nickname, after the domineering father in the play “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” and at the height of his power, it fit his 5-foot, 10 1/2-inch, 290-pound body. Part of it was his manner, his sharp eyes capable of boring into a person’s inner depths or most carefully concealed weakness, his deep voice, often warm and friendly, sometimes fierce.

He set one follower against another, but they all loved him. He could make someone feel like his closest friend, his most trusted ally--or the dumbest person in the world.

So when state Treasurer Jesse Marvin Unruh, former Speaker of the Assembly and a giant of California politics, died last Aug. 4, it was not surprising that he had fixed things to make sure his power over his family and friends would continue long after his death. And it has, in a tangled, sad fight over an estate that he estimated at more than $2 million in property, stocks and cash and a separate fund containing at least $1.3 million in unused campaign contributions.

In the end, Unruh had too many obligations, had made too many promises. “I told him it was chaos,” a friend said. “I told him it would result in the chaos that happened. He didn’t care. He felt that who wins, wins. It was vintage Jesse Unruh.”

As death neared, Unruh, often groggy from morphine to kill the pain of cancer that had started in his prostate and spread to his bones, tried to sort out those obligations to his wife, Chris, his five children and a young woman with whom he had lived. The papers disposing of his estate tell the story: Unruh changed his bequests seven times in nine days--once in weak, barely legible handwriting. His wife’s share was increased, his children’s reduced. And the young woman was dropped from the will.

Sadly, for his survivors, Big Daddy is no longer there to sort it out for them. Yet he continues to dominate their lives. “I’m looking at it, thinking, ‘Oh, my God, my family has turned into bad soap opera,’ ” said Unruh’s daughter, Linda. “It’s ‘Dynasty’ in the newspapers.” His children, ranging in age from 32 to 41, suffer from the anger and disbelief of offspring faced with a will that tells them that one of their father’s last acts was to reduce their share of the estate.

“Well, there’s no question about it, there are a number of irregularities. There are assets that are missing and unaccounted for. I think we basically feel fairly well betrayed,” said Unruh’s oldest son, Bruce, who said he and the other Unruh children had accepted their stepmother. “I think she was accepted and that’s basically part of the feeling of being betrayed.”

Chris Unruh declined to be interviewed for this story.

Discord Grew

Discord among family and friends was growing as Unruh lay dying in the home he had built in Marina del Rey.

It was a scene from the rich tradition of American politics, the death and wake of a political boss: drinks, stories, friends and family mourning not only for the boss but for themselves. He had done them significant favors, given them jobs or, more important, granted them place and status in the community by allowing them to live in his shadow. This event was all of that, with one wonderful Unruh touch. It was a wake before death and the boss, in his alert moments, could enjoy it.

“We had something that must have been like an Oriental potentate dying,” said a friend. “People all over the house. The death of an emperor.”

Some poured drinks from a bar near Unruh’s rented hospital bed, in the middle of the big and airy living room, with its cathedral ceiling and windows overlooking the canal. A large dining area and kitchen adjoined the living room, leaving plenty of space for the continuous farewell.

As death approached, Unruh napped or watched a big-screen television set in front of his bed. He had rented the films he wanted to see in the final days of his life and watched them. A friend recalled that if he was not interested in the conversation, he would turn up the TV or go to sleep. Nearby was a hospice nurse, a specialist in ministering to the dying. She helped him confront and accept the final stages of his terminal illness.

There was a mythic, grand quality about Unruh on his deathbed, a quality that had distinguished him throughout his political career. He strode through the Capitol in the years of his speakership, from 1961-68, accompanied by the hardest-edged, meanest aides and the most politically skilled legislators. When this awesome group first appeared in the Capitol halls, surrounding their gigantic leader, they were immediately called the Praetorian Guard, after the deadly fighters who guarded Roman emperors.

They All Waited

From early morning until nightfall, his office waiting room was full of people seeking favors from the boss. The most powerful business lobbyists, the biggest labor union men, the minor bosses who got out the vote for Unruh candidates in Democratic Los Angeles, San Francisco and Oakland all waited. To sit there in the mornings, just watching, was a way for a reporter to find out what was going on and to try to understand the meaning of someone so powerful he could turn all those big men in the waiting room into the meekest of supplicants.

Unruh began as a GI Bill student at USC after World War II; represented middle-class, working-class Inglewood in the Assembly; served as Speaker; ran for governor in 1970 and for mayor of Los Angeles in 1973 and then was state treasurer from 1975 until his death. His greatest moments were in the Assembly in the mid-1960s, when the house would silently and respectfully await the orders that rumbled out in a deep voice. Civil rights legislation, a great expansion of education, new state parks, new programs for the mentally ill and retarded, consumer protection, and medical aid for the poor emerged from the Capitol, mostly because of Unruh’s leadership.

That kind of political power, backed by staff research and directed by the Speaker as he prowled the Assembly floor, changed politics in Sacramento and the state. His creation of a skilled legislative staff, his building loyalty among Assembly members by collecting and distributing campaign contributions, and his power in bargaining with governors defined the speakership in its modern terms.

“I think he seemed to have some sort of charisma that drew people,” says Linda Unruh. “People that he didn’t have contact with for years still felt loyal to him. I don’t understand it, except that is what a good politician draws on--people. You can treat somebody really bad and they are still loyal. . . . It was what one person said: if he had ever been in trouble, he could have gone to (Unruh) for help. . . .”

‘Barbs Across the Table’

But there was another side to Unruh. “My family, we fight,” Linda said. “Comfortable dinner conversation is barbs across the table . . . so fighting was comfortable. And the other thing you get out of fighting, which is very logical, you pit people against each other and they’re all going to come to you and tell you what the other person is doing. You never have any problem knowing what your staff is doing. And it’s easier to manipulate people.”

“Jess didn’t like things to be calm,” said Chief Deputy State Treasurer Elizabeth Whitney. “He liked things to be stirred up. He liked to watch the interplay between people.” Or, as another observer put it, everyone around him was a colonel, with the prerogatives and limitations of that rank. “The colonel system is a great system when there is a general around. But when he’s not there, the people are going to be tearing each other to shreds.”

Such qualities may have been born of a difficult, impoverished childhood on Depression-era farms in Kansas and Texas. “His father was one of the most cantankerous people I have ever met in my life,” says Linda Unruh. Jesse Unruh, she said, once watched his father whip a mare that had stumbled while pulling a plow on the family farm. “One day, when he was 16, he took out a whip and went over to his father and whipped him a couple of times and told him if he ever (hit the horse) again, he’d kill him.”

She remembers family visits to her grandfather and Unruh’s sister, in Hemet in rural Riverside County. “They would buy a case of beer or a six-pack of beer and sit down and (Unruh) and his sister would get into some horrible arguments. I don’t remember over what.”

Whatever the reason for Unruh’s proclivity for conflict, there is no doubt it has darkened the days of those closest to him at his death. This is a diverse group, with only one common characteristic, a deep loyalty to Unruh. Among them are:

- Chris Edwards Unruh, his wife. She had gone with Unruh for more than a decade before they married in 1986. She was a bright presence at social events, her outgoing personality contrasting with Unruh’s sometimes dark moods and sarcasm.

- Kristine McIntyre, the woman Unruh had left to return to Chris. “I think he loved her, or I think he thought he loved her,” says his son, Robert. They shared a house Unruh owned in Sacramento, his children said. One friend recalled going on picnics with the couple and McIntyre’s young child.

- His children, Bruce, Bradley, Randall, Robert and Linda. Their mother, Virginia, had married Unruh when he was in the Navy in World War II, had pushed him to graduate from USC and was an important part of his political career. They were divorced in 1975.

- Grover McKean, an attorney who served Unruh as chief deputy state treasurer before putting his knowledge of the bond business to work as an investment banker. The politician saw in McKean the kind of cynical hard edge it took to become part of Unruh’s old Assembly Praetorian Guard. McKean has inherited the sad job of untangling his mentor’s affairs.

- Frank Burns, an attorney and lobbyist. Through the years, Burns was one of Unruh’s closest friends and advisers, although he stayed out of the Sacramento spotlight and carefully avoided talking to reporters. Burns was trustee of Unruh’s estate until he turned the job over to McKean last Sept. 21.

- Madale Watson, an Unruh friend and political associate for about 30 years. Watson, suspicious of outsiders, devoted to Unruh, was the Unruh political organization treasurer, the imposing keeper of the political funds. She was perfect for the job. Possessed of information for which reporters or political opponents would have killed, she knew when to keep her mouth shut.

- Elizabeth Whitney, chief deputy treasurer when Unruh died and now acting state treasurer. Whitney, a political junkie since childhood, met Unruh when he spoke to her class at Loyola-Marymount University. After college, she landed a job in the treasurer’s office and was a quick student of Unruh’s methods. She moved up steadily and ran the office for Unruh during his final illness.

- Attorney Kenneth Berk, who had been a driver and aide to Unruh during the Los Angeles mayoral campaign. Over the years, they developed something of a father-son relationship. Berk’s wife, Marilyn, was a close friend of Chris Unruh. During Unruh’s last days, the Berks moved into his house to help out.

Unruh found out about the final illness that brought them all together in 1984. A friend remembers going to his Sacramento apartment for lunch with a girlfriend. “Girls, I’m going down to San Francisco this afternoon to see the doctor,” the friend recalls him saying. “He said he had the ‘Big C.’ ” He called the children together in Los Angeles and told them that he had cancer of the prostate. He also told them he was not going to let doctors remove the gland.

2 Kinds of Power

Some friends, who asked not to be identified, said they believed he refused to have his prostate removed because he feared it would prevent him from having sexual relations. Much of Unruh’s life, they said, centered around his many affairs; to him, sexual and political power seemed related.

In his book on the Unruh years, “A Disorderly House,” Unruh’s friend and former colleague, James R. Mills, quotes Unruh as saying: “It takes more drive to succeed in politics than in any other field I can think of. It takes a hell of a set of gonads to get to the top. I don’t think it’s surprising if successful politicians also manifest their sex drive in normal ways.”

Sex was a part of life, friends said, that he did not want to give up. “I was raised in a household,” says daughter Linda, “where politics, sex and partying were three of the major things in life. They were what made life fun.”

Instead of surgery, he underwent radiation treatment and chemotherapy, according to friends familiar with his condition. For a time, he believed he had beaten the disease.

In 1986, he began his campaign for a fourth term as treasurer. “When he filed for office, we had no clue. We were still getting clean bills of health, totally. I don’t know what we would have done had we known there was a problem,” said Elizabeth Whitney.

Others were not so sure about his health. If he was ill, said Linda, “he was not admitting it to himself. That’s why he refused to allow anybody to speak about it, to talk about it. And like a good politician, he thought it might hurt his election. The Republicans would have thought he was vulnerable if he was dying.”

Cancer Worsens

By summer, the cancer had worsened. “He had bone cancer by the summer of 1986,” said Linda. “But the family never discussed that. We didn’t discuss it. Everything we figured out was through watching and . . . and seeing how much medication he had around the house.”

His wishes were spelled out in three documents--a will he signed on Oct. 3, 1986; a trust he created to preserve his estate for the future use of his heirs, and an agreement placing more than $1.3 million in campaign contributions with an organization called Friends of Jess Unruh and headed by Berk, Watson, Burns, McKean, Whitney and Robert Unruh.

Through the years, according to financial statements filed with the state, Unruh had slowly built up his wealth, mostly by investing in real estate.

An investment in the Pacific Holiday Towers apartment building in Long Beach that had “negative value” in 1975 was worth more than $100,000 and brought him an income of more than $10,000 a year a decade later. Land he owned in Fallbrook in San Diego County escalated in value. The Marina del Rey lot he bought for $7,000 in 1977, and where he built his house, became part of a valuable beach area residential subdivision. He bought and sold a condominium in Marina del Rey and one in Playa del Rey at the height of Los Angeles’ Westside real estate boom. He bought and sold computer and oil stocks before putting money into mobile home parks as tax shelters. He reported owning state of Alaska housing bonds worth more than $100,000.

Unruh, proud of his investment skills, told friends that he believed it all was worth more than $2 million, although Frank Burns and Grover McKean both said they felt he overvalued his wealth.

To his wife Chris, he left $250,000 if he died before Jan. 7, 1987, or $150,000 if he died after that. Citing attorney-client privilege, the lawyers will not discuss why Unruh directed that it be that way. He also gave her the right to occupy the Marina del Rey house for six months rent-free plus all the furnishings, artwork and silverware in the home.

Second Thoughts

“To Kristine McIntyre,” the trust agreement said, “$40,000.” The amount had been typed in as $50,000 but was crossed out and $40,000 written in and initialed by Unruh. He also left McIntyre all furnishings in the Sacramento house, plus the privilege of living there for nine months after his death.

His grandson, Geoffrey, was given $25,000. Old friend and associate Madale Watson got $10,000 and $5,000 went to Anthony Agosta, a nephew of Chris.

The rest was to be divided equally among his children.

Frank Burns was made trustee of the estate.

Weeks later, Unruh made the first of many changes. By then he had left Kristine McIntyre in Sacramento and returned to Los Angeles to marry Chris. McIntyre’s bequest was again lowered, this time from $40,000 to $30,000, and a cherrywood desk in the Sacramento home that was to have gone to her was left, instead, to his wife. But he also cut his wife’s share by $10,000.

Early in 1987, Unruh was admitted to UCLA Medical Center. “I don’t know if they had him on too high a medication or he was taking too much,” said Linda. “He had been on it for quite some time. He must have been on morphine for six to eight months. He was on morphine by the time he married Chris. So he had been on heavy pain medication for a long time, upping it. If you are in pain and realize you are dying, I would assume you think, ‘Who cares how much I take? I just don’t want this pain.’ It is not like you are trying to save your life for something in the future.”

At this time, the first hints of a schism between the Unruh children and his wife, Chris, appeared. It remained just an undertone until he died, and then it exploded.

Nagging Questions

“Chris called me and . . . told me he was in the hospital,” Linda Unruh said. “He was OK, but not to bother and come and visit because he wasn’t allowed visitors, which flagged me right there because they never tell you children can’t come and visit their parents. . . . I was told he didn’t want to see me. That’s what she was telling me. The doctors didn’t want me to see him. And I believed her. I was supportive. I believed at the time she was taking care of him. . . . I mean, it didn’t make sense to me, but you don’t think of sense when somebody is dying like that. . . . I was very supportive of Chris until I saw the changes in the will . . . and that’s when I started questioning: was it really that he didn’t want to see me or was it that we were being kept away so all those changes could be made.”

From May until just before his death last August, Unruh made four changes in the trust distributing his estate, two changes in his will and three in the political fund agreement. Seven of the changes were made in the final days of his life.

As they were made, the tension grew. Relations between him and the children were not smooth. He had been, like many politicians, an absent father, creating resentment that followed the children into adulthood. Their anger troubled him and, in June, he sought reconciliation.

Linda Unruh said the UCLA therapist who had arranged the hospice care for her father asked to see the family. “She and Chris and my brothers and I sat in the living room of the house,” Linda Unruh said. “She basically told us he was dying and he wanted to see more of us, but he had a lot of anxiety . . . about the children, about what he might not have done right. Fatherly guilt and anxiety, but he wanted to see more of us.

Focus on Anger

“But he could not deal with our anger. And we were pretty angry by that point because we were being told by everyone around him except the state police that he didn’t want to see us, that he was too tired, too whatever. So she’s telling us he wants to see us but can’t deal with our anger, to which our answer was that we never take out our anger on our father. . . . He’s smarter than that. He never allowed us to take out our anger on him.”

Tensions within the family were becoming more evident. In May, he sold the Sacramento house he had shared with Kristine McIntyre, boosted Chris Unruh’s bequest to $250,000--minus the proceeds of his life insurance--and cut McIntyre out entirely. He received $225,000 for the house. He had paid $207,000 cash for it, friends and his children said.

In July, Unruh’s health deteriorated even more. Frank Burns and his wife, Patsy, paid a last visit before they left on a vacation.

“During the evening he was up and down,” said Burns. “He came into the dining room where we were having dinner and sat with us for a while. . . . There were times when I was there when he was asleep, times when he was up and alert.”

On July 23, he made two more changes in the will. This time, he gave his wife an extra year to live in the Marina del Rey house. And he reinstated Kristine McIntyre, leaving her $25,000. His signature was shaky, barely legible.

The second change was handwritten. In it, he said that “my wife Chris Unruh shall receive a one-sixth . . . share of the residue of my trust estate and my living issue (children) shall share equally in the remaining . . . five-sixths of the trust.” His signature was slightly more legible than in the first change.

Last Visit

A day or so later, Elizabeth Whitney, his chief deputy, paid her last visit. She said she talked to him. “He was in an unconscious state. . . . I kept talking to him and finally he woke up and said my name, which made me very happy, and squeezed my hand. That was the last time. I sat there for a while and left.”

On July 31, five days before his death, Unruh made the final changes in disposing of his estate. He restated the provision for his wife’s share and once again dropped Kristine McIntyre. The document said it was his “intention that Kristine McIntyre receive nothing under the declaration of trust.”

The rush of changes extended to the committee he had set up to supervise his unspent campaign contributions. Mysteriously, an important change was not discovered until after his death when Burns received in his office a typed paper, dated July 26,

saying that “my wife Chris Unruh is hereby added as an officer of the committee.” It bore Unruh’s signature, more vigorous than in previous changes, and on the bottom had this handwritten note: “I acknowledge the receipt of a copy of this document,” signed by Kenneth Berk and Chris Unruh. Their signatures were dated July 29. Below that was a handwritten note, apparently from Unruh to his attorney, Marvin Shapiro: “Dear Marv, after my death, I have instructed my wife Chris to deliver this document removing Elizabeth Whitney as an officer of the Friends of Jess Unruh.”

That letter arrived after weeks of growing discord between Whitney and Chris Unruh. Whitney insisted she was still on the committee. McKean obtained a letter from Paul Frimmer, an attorney in Shapiro’s office, stating that “there is no provision for removal of officers after Jess’ death” and that Whitney “remains an officer.” This month, the committee tried to settle things. The seven members, including Chris Unruh and Elizabeth Whitney, met in what one participant called a “civil” atmosphere.

Grief Prolonged

This past May, nine months after Unruh’s death, family members and some of the old friends began to straighten out the mess he left behind. For them, the job has cruelly prolonged the grief, which began with news of the finality of his illness, continued through his last days and should have tapered off after the emotionalism of a funeral so big that it required state and Santa Monica city police to direct traffic.

Big Daddy has remained a huge presence. A son broke down in tears twice during an interview about his father. One of the toughest of the old Praetorians cried when describing the death scene. Some studied the documents he left behind, jealously convinced that their own special relationship with Unruh would provide them the key to solve the puzzle of why so many last-minute changes were made.

He had, some of his friends said, carefully constructed the estate to take care of all of those who had depended on him. But questions arose about the sale of the Sacramento house and the Alaskan bonds, items totaling at least $300,000. “Various parties in the estate are questioning where the money went,” said attorney Frimmer. “I have not been able to ascertain where the money went, but the executor and trustee (McKean) is looking into the questions. I don’t know what happened to the money.”

All that is certain is that he left behind the mystery of his deathbed changes. The mystery still controls those who loved him. Was it intentional? Or was this a terrible error of a mind clouded by pain and morphine?