Kerry Packer; Founder of World Series Cricket
Kerry Francis Bullmore Packer, Founder of World Series Cricket was born to Sir Frank Packer on 17 December 1937 in Sydney.
Kerry was grown up in Sydney, Australia. At age eight he suffered from a severe bout of poliomyelitis. The disease left him confined to an iron lung for almost nine months which suffered his primary schooling adversely. Sir Frank Packer, Kerry’s father apparently underestimated his son’s abilities, once brutally calling him as "the family idiot", even though Kerry later took PBL to the heights far ahead of anything his father or brother attained. Kerry himself, in an interview, confessed that he was "academically stupid" and survived Geelong Grammar School through sport. It is reported that Packer was dyslexic.
Kerry Packer was Australia's richest man and Media tycoon. His family company had controlling interests in both the Nine Television Network and top Australian publishing company Australian Consolidated Press. ACP later through a merger became Publishing and Broadcasting Limited (PBL).
Packer family was awarded with The Order of Australia, an order of gallantry established by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia on February 14, 1975 for according recognition to the Australian citizens and other persons for accomplishment or for meritorious service.
The Packer family has been involved in media and publishing for several age brackets in Australia. After the death of Frank Packer in 1974 Kerry took over the control of his family business. Over the years, Packer persistently expanded and grew the company. In 1994 the companies through a merger became part of the Publishing and Broadcasting Limited Company (PBL). The core industries that Kerry’s PBL has interests in are Television broadcasting and production, magazine distribution and publication, and gaming.
The Media Magnate is famous in the world of sports for starting World Series Cricket (WSC). It was a break free professional cricket contest played between 1977 and 1979 and organized by Kerry for his Australian TV network, Nine Network. The series was staged in opposition to the established international cricket. Kerry’s World Series Cricket brought a drastic change in the nature of cricket, and its influence goes on to be felt today.
Two main factors led to The World Series - the prevalent opinion that players were not paid enough to make a livelihood from cricket, and that Kerry Packer wanted to protect the exclusive television rights to Australian cricket, at that time held by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).
After the (ACB) rejected Channel Nine's proposal to gain exclusive broadcasting rights to Australia's Test matches in 1976, Packer organized his own series by signing agreements secretly with top Australian, English, West Indian players, South African and Pakistani, most notably Australian skipper Greg Chappell, English captain Tony Greig, West Indies skipper Clive Lloyd, and former Australian Captain Ian Chappell. Packer’s series was funded by businessmen Austin Robertson and John Cornell. Both the financers were involved with the preliminary setup and administration of the World Series.
Kerry Packer and his 42 years old wife, Roslyn, had two kids, a son James and a daughter Gretel.
Packer was a fanatical polo player, an ardent gambler and a longtime intense smoker. Intense smoking is the reason that Packer reportedly had eight heart attacks. In 1990, Packer suffered a heart attack while playing his favorite game of Polo at Warwick Farm, Sydney, that left him clinically dead for six minutes. Packer had a heart bypass surgery in 1998in New York. He also had a kidney transplant in 2000, donated by his long-serving helicopter pilot and friend of more than 2 decades Nick Ross.
He was fabulous for his titanic wins and losses. In 1999, he faced gambling loss of $28 million, biggest reported loss in British history at the times.
When died in 2005, Packer - being one of the most influential figures in the history of the cricket - was mourned with a minute's silence at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).
Packer at the time of his death was the richest and one of the most powerful men in Australia. In 2004 an Australian weekly magazine, Business Review Weekly, figured out Packer's net worth at AUD 6.5 billion.
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