Daniel Harrison Overmyer (December 6, 1924 – July 24, 2012) was an American businessman, warehouse mogul, and television broadcaster. During the height of his career, Overmyer was referred to as "the king of warehousing".
A second-generation warehouse operator, Overmyer aggressively expanded his holdings in the 1950s and 1960s with a warehouse design structure unlike prior models, which emphasized ease of transportation of goods and more efficient storage. At its height, the D. H. Overmyer Warehouse Company boasted over 350 warehouses and 32 million square feet of space in North America and Europe. Overmyer also extended his influence to television station ownership: between 1964 and 1965, a total of seven construction permits for ultra high frequency (UHF) stations were either granted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) or acquired in related transactions. Of these seven permits, only one, WDHO-TV in Toledo, Ohio, was built and signed on by Overmyer directly.
Financial constraints caused by an overexpansion in the warehouse business led Overmyer to sell majority control of the other unbuilt stations to American Viscose Corporation (AVC) in exchange for a loan. The FCC's deference on examining Overmyer's financial situation and the composition of the sale resulted in a congressional investigation and multiple FCC hearings that delayed the renewal of WDHO's broadcast license for a decade. Another planned venture, a fourth television network originally dubbed the Overmyer Network, was sold by Overmyer to a group of investors weeks before launching in May 1967. Renamed the United Network, the network ceased operations after one month due to significant financial losses, cancelling their lone offering, The Las Vegas Show.
Overmyer's continued financial overextensions, coupled with his practice of borrowing from one corporate subsidiary to pay for another subsidiary, resulted in a prolonged series of Chapter 11 bankruptcy filings that lasted for nearly 12 years. Initially filed with the Southern District of New York (SDNY), allegations published in the New York Daily News of money laundering and financial kickbacks by an accounting firm headed by a brother of the presiding judge led to the judge's removal in 1978. The bankruptcies enveloped all of Overmyer's 41 subsidiaries: when the subsidiary holding WDHO's license was led out of bankruptcy by SDNY in 1981, that subsidiary filed for bankruptcy again in Cleveland, Ohio. Allegations of Overmyer and an associate defrauding the bank that held stock in WDHO led the bank to seize control of the station, selling it to a third party. All of Overmyer's other assets were auctioned off by SDNY throughout 1985. Overmyer was eventually convicted of bankruptcy fraud in 1989 in federal court following investigations by both the FBI and IRS.
Early life
Overmyer was born in Toledo, Ohio, the only child of Harrison Morton Overmyer and Cora Belle (Pooke) Overmyer. Overmyer was adopted. While his mother was described as "prim and proper" and his father "mild-mannered, slender ... whose dress was so impeccable", he gained a reputation for being a bully, with an "obnoxious" demeanor, a slovenly wardrobe and was overweight throughout his life. His grandfather was a Toledo grocery wholesaler early in the 20th century, while Harrison operated a single warehouse in the city, the Merchant's and Manufacturers Warehouse. Growing up in Ottawa Hills, Ohio, Overmyer graduated from Ottawa Hills High School and attended Denison University in Granville, Ohio.
While a Denison student in 1943, Overmyer was drafted into the army; he served as a private and transport warrant officer during World War II, and helped with barge unloadings during the landings in Normandy on D-Day. Overmyer grew up a fan of the Toledo Mud Hens, the city's minor league baseball club, and unsuccessfully tried to buy the team at the age of 27.
In 1947, Overmyer opened his first warehouse on Smead Avenue in Toledo, financed with $2,000 borrowed from his father. The warehouse chain grew quickly, expanding from seven branches in 1954 to 260 buildings in 55 cities nationwide by 1965. Overmyer is credited with the creation of modern warehouse design; while most, including the Smead Avenue facility, were multi-story facilities, they were redesigned by Overmyer to be long, narrow, single-story buildings with high ceilings, removing a large bottleneck in transporting goods. By 1966, Duns Review called Overmyer "the undisputed king of the warehousemen". Overmyer founded the D. H. Overmyer Company, Inc. as a holding company for warehouse subsidiaries throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe, with 350 warehouses and 32 million square feet of space. Overmyer typically set up loans for far much more than the actual construction cost for a warehouse, believing loan officers, insurance agents and retirement funds were easy targets.
Overmyer married Shirley King in 1943; they had four adopted children. Overmyer was arrested in 1953 when breaking in with another person into a Huron, Ohio, apartment to take back a foster child returned to their mother. The charges against him were eventually dropped. After Harrison died in 1960, Cora was named as the main beneficiary to his $500,000 estate, but Overmyer sued Cora and the bank overseeing the estate. Two years after the litigation began, Cora died, and Overmyer asserted full control.
From 1962 to 1966, Overmyer controlled the Toledo Monitor, launched in 1959 as a business newspaper but ventured into yellow and tabloid journalism during his four-year tenure as owner. The Monitor championed future state legislator Charles Kurfess, later an attorney for Overmyer, but also promoted the likes of Westbrook Pegler, reflecting Overmyer's conservative beliefs, finding the Toledo Blade to be "left-wing". The Monitor folded 90 days after he sold it. He also established a bank, Progress National Bank, that grew from $1 million in assets to $5 million in two years.
Entering UHF broadcasting On April 15, 1963, Overmyer applied with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a license on channel 79 in Toledo, as the market's first ultra high frequency (UHF) television station, and the only such channel allocated to Toledo. While still a speculative investment in 1963, the All-Channel Receiver Act mandated the inclusion of UHF channels on newly constructed television sets. Overmyer stated in a 1966 interview, "we know that UHF is a solid investment ... the time has come for UHF television". Two other applicants also filed for the channel 79 allocation, prompting the FCC to open a comparative hearing beginning in March 1964. One of the applicants, Springfield Television, questioned Overmyer's financial qualifications, suggesting the warehouse company had inadequate funds to operate a television station, which the FCC rejected. By September 1964, Overmyer agreed to pay the out-of-pocket expenses for both competitors to withdraw their applications.
While the application process for the Toledo permit was ongoing, Overmyer established the D. H. Overmyer Communications Company in June 1964. Headquartered in New York City, this company sought ownership of seven television stations, then the limit for station ownership, along with possible investments in cable and pay television. Over the next several months, Overmyer filed to purchase construction permits for WATL-TV in Atlanta, and two unbuilt stations: WNOP-TV in Newport, Kentucky, serving Cincinnati, Ohio, and KBAY-TV in San Francisco. Overmyer also applied for stations in Stamford, Connecticut, Dallas, Texas, and Rosenberg, Texas, serving Houston, Texas. The Stamford permit was withdrawn after Overmyer offered to purchase the license for silent station WAND-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and filed a waiver to own eight stations instead of seven, which the FCC rejected.
The Atlanta, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and San Francisco purchases were all approved by the FCC in 1965, as were the construction permits in Houston and Toledo; KBAY-TV's previous owner retained a minority interest. (Guide to reading History Cards) The UHF allocation table was modified by the FCC on June 4, 1965, affecting both the Houston and Toledo permits. The Toledo station, now at channel 24, took the call sign of WDHO-TV, derived from Overmyer's initials. Likewise, the call letters assigned for the other stations—KEMO-TV, WSCO-TV, WECO-TV, WBMO-TV, and KJDO-TV—were the initials of Overmyer's family members. WDHO-TV began operation on May 3, 1966, nominally as an independent but airing shows from ABC, CBS, and NBC that did not air on either WTOL-TV or WSPD-TV. The Dallas application initially was competed against by Maxwell Electronics Corporation, which ultimately won the license to channel 33 when that allocation opened up. The allocation change placed Overmyer's application, now on channel 27, against Gordon McLendon, owner of KLIF and KNUS-FM; Overmyer withdrew the application.
Purchase of equipment for the station began in late 1965; by 1966, a $3 million order was placed to purchase programming in 1966, and transmitter sites were secured later in 1966 for all but the Atlanta and Pittsburgh stations. The television stations were to have been financed by Overmyer's warehouse company, but the lead contractor for the warehouses encountered financial distress, owing $18 million to shareholders in 1967; this resulted in multiple unfinished buildings with liens placed on them. The warehouse company also had substantial overhead: the financial development team frequently traveled across the country, with monthly airfare as high as $80,000. Overmyer agreed to guarantee a $5–6 million debt from the contractor, which in turn restricted available funds to construct the television stations. By January 1967, only the San Francisco and Cincinnati stations had progress of any sort, and construction on the Atlanta, Pittsburgh and Houston stations had not started. The cash crunch brought on by guaranteeing the contractor's debt was later attributed as the reason for Overmyer's 1967 sale of Progress National Bank.
A fourth television network
Overmyer announced plans on July 12, 1966, to create the Overmyer Network, a fourth television network to compete against the Big Three television networks, hiring former ABC president Oliver Treyz as network president. Treyz said the network would provide eight straight hours of programming to affiliates, including two hours of news supplied by United Press International, thematic programming devoted to a different genre every night, and a two-hour late-night talk show from Las Vegas. The announcement was largely met with surprise, particularly given Overmyer's lack of experience and only having WDHO-TV in operation. The network received exclusive rights to the Continental Football League, and by December 1966, the Overmyer Network had signed TV stations in 123 markets, including 24 of the largest 25 markets. Industry analysts voiced skepticism over the network's prospects, and questioned if Overmyer actually had the financial resources to succeed.