Pacific Holdings Corp.: Murdock keeps his holdings quite private.

Pacific Holdings Corp.

Pacific Holdings Corp. is a private conglomerate owned by real estate developer and mergers-and-acquisition magnate David Murdock. Behind the workings of the company, observers can get a glimpse, if only briefly, of a tireless if elusive empire builder.

Although little known, Pacific Holding is comprised of companies involved in real estate and building materials. Murdock bought the company in 1978 for $29 million.

With 1988 revenues of $988 million, the company employs 22,000 people. Among the companies under the Pacific Holding umbrella are PHC Holdings, Anaheim Union Water Co., Santa Ana River Development Co., Armstrong Leasing Inc., J&S Leasing Inc., Huntington Tile Inc., International Mining Corp., Pacific-American Property Inc. and Pacific Clay Building Products.

But that long list of water companies, real estate companies and mining operations hardly exhausts the scope of Murdock's activities.

In 1985, he became the chief executive officer of Castle & Cooke, the Los Angeles-based public company that owns Dole Food Co., Oceanic Properties, and other subsidiaries.

Between Pacific Holdings and Castle & Cooke, Murdock controls more than 50 companies; he also owns a real estate development company and is chairman of Flexi-Van, a company that leases chassis for cargo containers. Fortune magazine estimates his net worth at $1.5 billion; his real estate holdings alone are worth $750 million, according to Town & Country magazine.

As a personality, Murdock is a hard-bitten loner, or at least has cultivated that image in the press. He rarely grants interviews.

"We have reporters calling all the time, but Mr. Murdock does not like news stories being written about him," said a Castle & Cooke spokeswoman in 1988. Said Carol Klein, director of marketing for Pacific Holdings, "We are a private company and we do not want to comment in any way."

Murdock, however, recently consented to speak to a reporter for the Chicago Tribune. In that interview, he described himself as "predictably unpredictable." Murdock added that he is "never neutral. You can't take risks and stay uncontroversial."

Murdock can speak with authority about taking risks. His story of rags-to-riches would seem hard to believe, even in an Irving Wallace novel.

Born in Kansas in 1917, Murdock was raised in poverty. A dyslexic, he never received a university degree.

When 22, newly discharged from the Army Air Corps, Murdock managed to buy a Detroit diner for $1,800, the legend goes. Although he had only six cents to his name, he borrowed $900 from two different lenders and convinced the seller to carry the rest of the loan.

Murdock turned the business around in months, sold it for $1,200 profit and moved to Phoenix to become a real estate developer. According to the Chicago Tribune, Murdock was a millionaire at 27 and quickly found a place among the city's power elite.

A real estate bust in the Arizona capital, however, took away much of Murdock's paper wealth, and he moved to Los Angeles to start anew at age 40. Much of Murdock's second fortune was made by buying companies, either for Castle & Cooke or Pacific Holdings.

A short list of his big buys include Cannon Mills Co. 1982 for $413 million, Flex-Van Corp. in 1983 for $62 million, 20 percent of Continental Group in 1984 for $175 million - in partnership with Peter Kiewit Son's Inc. to which he later sold out for $200 million.

In December he bought 6.5 percent of Beverly Enterprises, the troubled health-care chain. In the Tribune article, he described himself as "a perfectionist," and added, "I can be tough as steel." Business Month characterized Murdock's style as "jugular" and accused him of "bullying."

Murdock is not sentimental about layoffs. When he took over Castle & Cooke, Murdock cut the staff by 50 percent. And when he acquired Cannon Mills, Murdock fired 3,000 workers and told former employees living in company-owned housing to move out. Meanwhile, he actively worked to prevent the company from becoming unionized.

Not all of Murdock's bad temper is reserved for underlings. As a member of the board at Occidental Petroleum, Murdock's biting remarks at board meetings so enraged Chairman Armand Hammer that he repurchased Murdock's stock holdings in the oil company at a 40 percent premium. That left Murdock out in the cold - with a $100 million profit.

Real estate development, however, remains Murdock's passion. Although Castle & Cooke is best known for growing pineapples, Murdock plans ambitious resorts on the 98,000-acre island of Lanai, which is wholly owned by the company.

In Southern California, perhaps the best known project is Murdock Plaza. The 17-story, 252,000-square-foot office bulding in Westwood is now owned by movie producer Frederick "Ted" Fields and Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. Some observers credit the 1981 highrise with the revival of interest in the fashionable Westside area as an office market.

Murdock also scored a coup by creating the exclusive Regency Club, which is housed on the penthouse floor of Murdock Plaza. Nearly half the CEOs of Los Angeles' Top 100 industrial companies are members.

Another ambitious project - not related to Pacific Holdings - is in Thousand Oaks, where Murdock is building a community of $1 million homes surrounding a golf course.

But if his business style is iron fisted, his personal style is decidedly posh. He currently lives in Bel Air in a 64-room home, formerly occupied by hotel magnate Conrad Hilton, that Murdock bought in 1979 for $12 million. A staff of seven gardeners fuss over 50 flower beds.

He also owns a 12-bedroom vacation home on 3,000 acres in North Carolina, a lodge in Lanai, a Manhattan duplex and a 1,500-acre horse ranch north of Los Angeles.

The self-taught billionaire has also become a philanthropist, serving as co-chairman of the Joffrey Ballet and a board member of the Music Center of Los Angeles. And he cares enough about politics to have raised $7 million for the 1984 reelection of Ronald Reagan.

In Business Month, Murdock summed up his ambitions. `All my life I've had one desire: to be number one.`

PHOTO : Murdock Plaza: Home base for numerous Murdock holdings

PHOTO : David Murdock: Magnate shies away from publicity