1916-1993	inducted 2002

Ewing Marion Kauffman was born on a farm in Garden City, Missouri, in 1916. His family moved to Kansas City when he was a boy, and he called Kansas City home for the rest of his life.

Following his service in the Navy during World War II, Ewing Kauffman began working as a salesman for a pharmaceutical company. In 1950, his innately entrepreneurial spirit led him to start his own pharmaceutical company in the basement of his home.

He named his company Marion Laboratories Inc., using his middle name rather than his last name so his customers wouldn’t perceive him as a one-man operation. In his first year in business, he had sales of $36,000 and a net profit of $1,000. When he sold his company to Merrell Dow in 1989, it had grown to become a global diversified health care giant with nearly $1 billion in sales and employing 3,400 associates.

Mr. Kauffman brought more to Kansas City than an international business. With his purchase of the Royals in 1968, he brought major league baseball back to his hometown, boosting civic pride and the city’s economy. With the same entrepreneurial vision he had always used as his guide, he made the Royals a model sports franchise. The team developed young players who won six division titles, two American League pennants, and a World Series championship in 1985.

Ewing Kauffman’s most enduring legacy to his community and the world is the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. He established the Foundation with the same sense of opportunity he brought to his business endeavors, and, with the same convictions. Kauffman wanted his foundation to be innovative—to dig deep and get at the roots of issues to fundamentally change outcomes in people’s lives. He wanted to help young people, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, get a quality education that would enable them to reach their full potential. He saw building enterprise as one of the most effective ways to realize individual promise and spur the economy.

Today the mission of the Kauffman Foundation mirrors Ewing Kauffman’s commitment to fostering both ends of the opportunity continuum: education and entrepreneurship.

An Entrepreneur's Story

On October 27, 1985, a baseball sailed through the crisp autumn sky and settled into Darryl Motley’s glove for the final out of the seventh game of the World Series. Kansas City celebrated the greatest comeback in World Series history, and the Royals reigned as the first American League expansion team ever to win the championship.

Twenty years later, that championship win over the cross-state rival St. Louis Cardinals remains the Royals’ most celebrated moment, but it was not the pivotal moment in the story of the team’s owner, Ewing Kauffman. After all, in the history of sports franchises, there have been thousands of team owners. Scores have won the World Series. Some baseball team owners have changed the course of the game. A handful became leading philanthropists and established foundations to benefit society in meaningful ways. Only one did all of these things and constructed a plan that benefited his team and the community it represents years after his death. This is Ewing Kauffman’s remarkable legacy.

To chronicle the life and times of its founder, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation has produced a vivid and enduring film biography that highlights the events and influences that shaped Ewing Kauffman’s life and formed the basis of his donor intent for the Kauffman Foundation.

The film, produced by the award-winning production company Eleventh Day Entertainment, captures Ewing Kauffman’s unconventional approach to life—as an entrepreneur, baseball team owner, and philanthropist—and introduces his inspiring story to a whole new generation of Americans. The documentary, which premiered in the fall on Kansas City’s PBS affiliate, KCPT, creates a better understanding of Ewing Kauffman and his legacy for the Kauffman Foundation and his hometown.

Mr. Kauffman grew Marion Laboratories from modest beginnings into a billion-dollar pharmaceutical giant. He hired mavericks and encouraged them to bring new thinking and innovations that revolutionized the industry. His business succeeding beyond his wildest dreams, Mr. Kauffman turned his vigor, intellect, and wealth to a style of philanthropy that would dig deep and get at the roots of issues rather than merely addressing the symptoms.

Ewing Kauffman came to baseball ownership reluctantly. With his wife Muriel’s support and encouragement, he stepped up to the plate when he was convinced that the team would bring economic muscle to Kansas City. Once he committed to the idea, he poured the same energy, resources, and entrepreneurial genius that made him a successful businessman and philanthropist into the team. His competitive nature and instinct for innovation built a model sports franchise, a spectacular stadium, and a championship-caliber team.

Even in death, Ewing Kauffman left in place heroic measures to ensure the continued presence of the Royals in Kansas City. His intricate plan was a brilliant and noble gesture to keep the Royals in Kansas City, sell the team for a fair price, and have proceeds from the sale go to local charities. It was an act of love for his hometown that few have matched.

Mr. Kauffman’s visionary instincts and positive influence extended beyond the game. His response to his players’ involvement in baseball’s drug scandal was to sow the seeds of the Kauffman Foundation and its pragmatic, fact- and research-based approach to philanthropy that concentrates on finding novel solutions to society’s problems.

Ewing Kauffman lived life with a daring desire to shape the future and make others’ lives better. He remains a beloved figure, remembered for all that he brought to Kansas City and the nation, and for all that he gave.

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