J.B. Nethercutt

Jack Boison Nethercutt (October 11, 1913 – December 6, 2004) was an American businessman and car collector. He was the founder and namesake of the Nethercutt Collection, through which he is considered a pioneer of car collecting. Nethercutt holds the record for the most Best of Show titles (6) at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.

He co-founded Merle Norman Cosmetics in 1931 with his aunt Merle Norman and started as a delivery peddler for her early products, later ascending to the positions of chairman and chief executive officer of the company. He also served as a board member of the national Personal Care Products Council trade association and was president of the California Cosmetics Association.

Career

Merle Norman Cosmetics In 1931, Nethercutt's aunt spent $150 to open a small local cosmetics studio named Merle Norman Cosmetics in downtown Santa Monica to sell their homemade products. Norman created the products and Nethercutt peddled to dealers on his bicycle, picking up discarded boxes from groceries for packing shipments. Following his purchase, he would again make Merle Norman a privately owned company. By 1981, Nethercutt spent $5 million on Merle Norman's first nationwide advertising campaign, which had previously only used word-of-mouth marketing. The company also had begun experimentally selling in European markets, specifically Switzerland and Austria, earning a million dollars in first year sales. By the end of 1981, Merle Norman as a whole made over US$130 million and had expanded to over 2,700 studios in the US and Canada. By 2004, Merle Norman had expanded to eight countries internationally and was consistently in the top 50 of Entrepreneur magazine's Franchise 500. The company had a revenue of over $100 million and he passed the company down to his son, Jack Nethercutt II. In 1971, Nethercutt purchased a large land lot in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Sylmar. Construction began on a personal 60,000 square-foot 10 story tall building with six floors to house his vehicles and other antique collections, featuring his private penthouse on the top floor. The Nethercutt Collection was built next to a Merle Norman manufacturing plant.

In 1984 he bought back a 1936 Duesenberg Convertible Coupe for $800,000 that he sold to Las Vegas-based businessman William F. Harrah in 1961 for $5,000.

Over the period of 1959 to 2000 he gave the Bugatti Type 51 Dubos several restorations from its reverted Grand Prix No. 51133 chassis design to its former famous Dubos Coupe design with a dark purple paint.

In the early 2000s, the Nethercutt Collection expanded with a 40,000 square foot addition to the tower and a 60,000 square foot new display building directly across the street called the Nethercutt Museum, which is self-guided. Outside of the museum are his CPR steam locomotive Royal Hudson No. 2839 with a 1912 Pullman private car. By 2004, Nethercutt Collection and Museum included nearly 250 automobiles and led Autoweek to call the Nethercutt Collection one of America's five greatest automobile museums. Jay Leno described Nethercutt's collection as a "Smithsonian-style effort on the history of transportation in America" and "the hall of fame for cars."

He received widespread recognition as a notable car restorer.

Concours d'Elegance Nethercutt competed in dozens of Concours d'Elegance shows in North America with his cars from the collection and was one of the most successful competitors in history. He holds the most Best of Show victories at the pinnacle Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance at six: 1958 with a duPont Model G Merrimac Town Car, 1959 with a Bugatti Type 57C Gangloff Atalante Coupe, 1969 with a Duesenberg J Murphy Dual Cowl Phaeton, 1970 with a Daimler Double-Six 50 Royal Limousine, 1980 with the Duesenberg Twenty Grand, and 1992 with a Rolls-Royce Phantom II Brewster Town Car.

Nethercutt is widely regarded to be the greatest car restorer of all time. In 1986, he donated several million to the UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica, which led to the construction of the six-story Merle Norman Pavilion complex.

Personal life

Nethercutt married his high school sweetheart Dorothy Sykes in 1933. Dorothy was a collector of David Winter sculpted ceramics, including cottages, miniature pianos, and dolls which are featured in the Nethercutt Collection. Their marriage lasted over 70 years and they had two children, Jack and Robert, later having two grandchildren. Through Jack and his wife Helen he had three great-grandchildren, the Richards.

Nethercutt was friends with fellow Los Angeles-based car enthusiasts and collectors Jay Leno, Barry Meguiar, and Bruce Meyer. His San Sylmar estate was one of the largest houses in the United States at 60,000 square feet. It included a Louis XV style dining room and a large industrial kitchen that J.B. used for private dinners with French private chef Yvon Hunckler, who previously cooked for The Beverly Hills Hotel, Grand Hotel Birmingham, and Hôtel de Paris in Monaco. The sixth floor penthouse included a full balcony and a rotating Rococo-style bedroom overlooking the San Gabriel Mountains. thumb Nethercutt owned several private aircraft through Merle Norman Aviation: a Gulfstream I, Gulfstream II, and a Cessna 206, alongside a small helicopter fleet.

Awards and honors He won the 2001 Meguiar's Award for his 50 years of dedication to the restoration of historic automobiles. He was posthumously inducted into the American Theatre Organ Society hall of fame in 2005. The J.B. & Dorothy Nethercutt Most Elegant Closed Car Award'' at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance is named in their honor. The Nethercutt Emergency Center at the UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica was posthumously named after him. A road in Kenora was named after him in 2001.

Death Nethercutt died on December 6, 2004, in Santa Monica.