It’s a Long Way From Wall St. to Encino

Michael Milken may well be the best-known name on Wall Street. But on Ventura Boulevard, just a few blocks from his home, he is something of a stranger.

In a highly unscientific survey last week, the Times queried 100 people in Encino, the San Fernando Valley suburb where Milken grew up and still lives, and at Birmingham High School, where Milken graduated 25 years ago, to gauge how well known he is in his own back yard. People were picked at random in a telephone survey or asked to fill out a questionnaire in person.

Only a third of the people surveyed could correctly identify the Drexel Burnham Lambert executive and philanthropist as the nation’s premier junk bondsman and subject of a huge federal stock-fraud investigation.

And the rest? They listed Milken as everything from Encino’s mayor to heavyweight champ Mike Tyson’s divorce lawyer, a space shuttle astronaut, the new editor of The Times, the inventor of the fax machine and a character out of the television series “thirtysomething.” Some confused him with New York developer Donald Trump, computer whiz Steve Jobs and Walt Disney Co. Chairman Michael Eisner.

Because the survey was unscientific, definitive conclusions can’t be drawn from the results. Still, they suggest that Milken is far from a household name--even in his hometown.

“Somewhere I’ve read his name, but I don’t know of him. Is he an entertainer?” asked Alan Stein, a comic and producer at Encino’s L.A. Cabaret comedy club whose response was typical.

Which isn’t surprising. Other, professional surveys indicate that business people are not nearly as well known as entertainers. According to Marketing Evaluations, a Port Washington, N.Y., market research firm, the top celebrity in familiarity and appeal in most recent surveys was entertainer Bill Cosby with a 96% score, followed by actor Michael J. Fox at 90%. Chrysler Chairman Lee Iacocca scores about 71%, with Playboy founder Hugh Hefner at 67%.

Milken certainly isn’t lacking for publicity. A database survey of the nation’s largest newspapers, magazines and wire services showed that last year Milken’s name appeared in no fewer than 250 headlines. That does not include countless other Milken-related stories on Drexel or others touched by the insider trading scandal, such as imprisoned stock speculator Ivan Boesky.

Milken’s lack of name recognition comes as no surprise to Kenneth Lerer, his personal spokesman. “Michael has said he has never sought the spotlight. He wants his kids to grow up in a very normal fashion,” Lerer said.

Despite the recent attention, it is unlikely that Milken, 42, is even Encino’s most famous resident. That probably is singer Michael Jackson, who reportedly plans to move to a ranch near Santa Barbara this spring, but keep his Encino home.

Milken is undoubtedly Encino’s wealthiest resident. Last year, Forbes magazine estimated his fortune at $800 million.

He got that way by creating the market for “junk bonds,” which are high-yield, high-risk debt securities. Believing that many good companies were shunned from the financial markets, Milken from his Beverly Hills office built junk bonds into a market worth more than $160 billion, prompting some to call him the most important American financier since J.P. Morgan. But he also became controversial as the junk bonds he developed were used to fuel the ambitions of takeover specialists such as Revlon Chairman Ronald Perelman and TWA Chairman Carl C. Icahn.

Milken also is becoming increasingly known through his charitable empire. He and his wife donated $196 million to their three charitable foundations in 1987, according to recent state records. Also, Milken has been seen increasingly at public events such as baseball games with disadvantaged youths he is helping.

Most of his notoriety, however, has come from being the target of a massive government stock-fraud investigation. In September, the Securities and Exchange Commission accused him in a civil lawsuit of insider trading, manipulating stock prices and having an illegal stock-trading arrangement with Boesky. Milken has denied the SEC charges. He is expected to be indicted soon in New York.

Despite the notoriety that came with the insider trading scandal, few of the 100 people queried last week knew details of Milken’s predicament, even if they knew in general what he does for a living.

“I just know he’s in a lot of trouble,” said Henry Lipson, who has had a pharmacy on Ventura Boulevard in Encino since 1955.

The Encino survey was done in two parts. The first involved distributing questionnaires to 66 people along Encino’s main street, Ventura Boulevard, and at Birmingham High in Van Nuys. No one was told it was a newspaper survey. The questionnaires asked “Who is Michael Milken?” and offered a choice of 20 answers to choose from.

Of the 66 responses, 21, or slightly fewer than one-third, correctly identified Milken. The rate would have been lower had it not been for a group of students taking an accounting class at Birmingham, who presumably knew him because of their interest in business.

Some of the other results:

9% of the respondents picked Milken as Encino’s mayor. Encino does not have its own mayor, except for the celebrities who serve as honorary ones, because it is part of Los Angeles.

8% identified him as Tyson’s divorce lawyer. (Howard Weitzman is Tyson’s lawyer.) Another 8% thought Milken was the county supervisor--Mike Antonovich-- who was reelected in November over Baxter Ward. And 8% more thought Milken was the Times’ new editor. (Shelby Coffey III is the new editor.)

6% confused Milken with President-elect George Bush’s choice to be Treasury secretary, Nicholas Brady.

5% said he was the New York real estate developer and Atlantic City casino owner Donald Trump or computer pioneer Jobs. Still another 5% of those questioned thought Milken was a “thirtysomething” character.

3% said he was a crew member on the space shuttle Discovery. Another 3% answered that Milken was the inventor of the fax machine. And about 3% thought Milken was an unsuccessful Oscar nominee for best actor last year.

The other part of the survey involved asking 25 Encino residents, whose names were randomly selected from the telephone book and 9 local community or business leaders, whether they could identify Milken.

He was easily identified by Steve Edwards, a Los Angeles talk-show host who serves this year as Encino’s honorary mayor, and Jan Sobel, executive director of the Encino Chamber of Commerce. So did Larry Buck, who sells hot dogs from a cart at Encino Park near Milken’s home.

But others stumbled. Postmaster Barry Seltzer said he could not identify Milken. Also having trouble was Mark Wilson, a professional magician who this year is Encino’s honorary sheriff.

Milken is largely a stranger today at Birmingham High, where in 1964 he practiced high-yield pep as head cheerleader--along with actress Sally Field--was named prom king and served as a member of the Boys League service organization with Michael Ovitz, who went on to become a Hollywood “superagent” as head of Creative Artists Agency.

Neal Federman, who teaches an economics class at Birmingham, recalls discussing the insider trading scandal last year during one of his classes. He said that nearly all of the students did not know who Milken was, even those students who live near him.

“Across the board I would say they have no idea who he is,” Federman said. Part of the reason may be because the school is much different from the neighborhood suburban high school it was in Milken’s day, with one-third of the 3,100 students now bused to the school from inner-city areas.

Federman said, however, that one student in the class discovered who Milken was after scores of reporters and photographers started hanging around his neighborhood, where Milken lives.

The student “had noticed there were people standing outside the house trying to talk to Milken or waiting to get a picture of him as he emerged,” Federman said.

WHO IS MICHAEL MILKEN? Junk bond king Mike Milken is one of the best known names on Wall Street, but what about on Ventura Boulevard? As part of an unscientific survey, 66 people were asked to identify Milken on a questionnaire. Those surveyed were in his hometown of Encino or at Birmingham High School in Van Nuys, where he graduated in 1964. Less than one in three correctly identified him. Incorrect answers are also listed below.*

(32%) Junk-bond financier at Drexel Burnham Lambert accused of violating stock trading laws

(9%) Mayor of Encino

(8%) Lawyer for boxing champ Mike Tyson

(8%) County Supervisor representing part of the San Fernando Valley

(8%) New editor of the Los Angeles Times

(6%) President-elect Bush’s choice for Treasury Secretary

(5%) Founder of Apple Computer who left to form NeXT computer firm

(5%) New York-based real estate developer/casino owner who wrote “The Art of the Deal”

(5%) Character on TV show “thirtysomething”

(3%) Inventor of the fax machine

(3%) Crew member on recent Discovery space shuttle flight

(3%) Michael Dukakis’ presidential campaign chairman

(3%) Nominated for Oscar for best actor last year, but lost to Michael Douglas

(3%) First singer to record duet with Julio Iglesias

(2%) Head of Walt Disney

(2%) Last New York Yankee manager fired by George Steinbrenner

* Percentages are rounded off and do not add up to 100%.