Julius M. Westheimer, 88; Investment Banker Appeared Regularly on ‘Wall Street Week’
Julius M. Westheimer, a Baltimore investment banker who appeared regularly for 29 years on the nationally syndicated television program “Wall Street Week” with Louis Rukeyser, died Wednesday at his Pikesville, Md., home. He was 88.
Westheimer also wrote a financial column, “Ticker,” for the Baltimore Sun from 1977 to 2001 and dispensed advice on two Baltimore radio stations.
“Julius was a legend in the investment business,” Bill Miller, chief executive of Legg Mason Capital Management, said this week. “He gave of himself to the local community in a way very few others in the investment community did.”
Westheimer was born Sept. 6, 1916, to a Baltimore investment banker and his wife. He earned his bachelor’s degree with honors from Dartmouth in 1938 and got a $35-a-week job in the toy department at Macy’s in New York. He returned to Baltimore in 1940 to work at his grandfather’s department store.
Westheimer rose to become president of the company, but after it merged with another department store, he went to work in 1961 for a Baltimore investment firm analyzing business and financial trends for his stock-purchasing clients.
Westheimer’s appearances on “Wall Street Week” stemmed from a luncheon in 1961 with Rukeyser, who was then chief of the Baltimore Sun’s London bureau. Over the ensuing years, the two men got to know each other, and when Rukeyser began his “Wall Street Week” series in 1971, Westheimer was among the early guests.
“He was a reporter in stockbroker’s clothes,” said Frank Cappiello, who appeared on the program as a panelist with Westheimer through much of the show’s run. “He always wanted to be a writer, and he combined it in an odd sense on ‘Wall Street Week.’ ”
In April, a year after he ended his long stint at WBAL-TV, Westheimer began administering investment advice on a WYPR-FM feature called “Julius Westheimer’s Money Minute” that aired twice daily.
“Clearly, he loved doing what he was doing, since he kept at it up until his death,” said C. Fraser Smith, WYPR’s news director.
He was also active in charitable groups.
He served in the Army Air Forces during World War II.
Westheimer’s first wife, Ernestine Hartheimer, died in 1985.
He is survived by his second wife, the former Dorrit Feuerstein Kohn; two daughters; two stepdaughters; a stepson; a sister; a granddaughter; four step-grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.
