Del Webb

 ( 1899 Births ) 

A former semiprofessional baseball player and a lifelong fan, Webb and partners Dan Topping and Larry MacPhail purchased the New York Yankees in 1945 for $2.8 million from the estate of Col. Jacob Ruppert After buying out MacPhail in October 1947, Webb and Topping remained owners of the Yankees until selling the club to CBS in 1964 for $11.2 million. During those 20 seasons, the Yankees were in 15 World Series, winning 10.

In 1946, mobster Bugsy Siegel hired Webb as the general contractor for the Flamingo Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. After boasting about his claim that he had personally killed 16 men, Siegel said to Webb, "Del, don't worry, we only kill each other", after seeing the panicked look on Webb’s face.Jennings, We Only Kill Each Other. (1992). p. 17 Aside from Howard Hughes, Webb would become the largest casino owner in Nevada after his Webb Corporation acquired the Sahara Nevada Corporation and its holdings of the Sahara and Mint hotels in Las Vegas.

In 1948, Webb was contracted to build 600 houses and a shopping center called Pueblo Gardens in Tucson, Arizona. San Manuel, Arizona, a mining company town and later a resort town, followed. Established in 1953, the town was built by Webb (along with M.O.W. Homes Inc.) for the Magma Copper Company. It required the building of streets, shopping centers, schools, a hospital, and parks. This was a prelude to Sun City, Arizona, which launched on January 1, 1960, with five home models, a shopping center, a recreation center, and a golf course. The opening weekend drew 100,000 people, 10 times more than expected, and resulted in a Time cover story.