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Ian Robert Maxwell (10 June 1923 – 5 November 1991) was a Czechoslovakian-born British media proprietor and former Member of Parliament (MP), who rose from poverty to build an extensive publishing empire.

Early life

Robert Maxwell was born Ján Ludvík Hoch in the small town of Slatinské Doly, Carpathian Ruthenia, the easternmost province of pre-World War II Czechoslovakia (now Solotvino, Ukraine) into a poor Yiddish-speaking Jewish family. His parents were Mechel Hoch, and Hannah Slomowitz. He had 6 siblings. In 1939, the area was reclaimed by Hungary. Most members of his family were gassed in Auschwitz after Hungary was occupied in 1944 by its former ally, Nazi Germany but he had already escaped, arriving in Britain in 1940 as a 17-year-old refugee. He joined the British Army Pioneer Corps in 1941 and transferred to the North Staffordshire Regiment in 1943. He fought his way across Europe from the Normandy beaches, at which time he was still a sergeant, to Berlin. His intelligence and gift for languages gained him a commission in the final year of the war, and eventual promotion to captain, and in January 1945 he received the Military Cross. It was during this time that British Intelligence changed his name several times (Maxwell was in British Intelligence, and this was a means of protecting him from the Germans), finally settling on Ian Robert Maxwell, which was the last name he was using at the end of the war. He almost never used the "Ian", however; he only retained it as a vestige of his original name. Also in 1945, he married Elisabeth "Betty" Meynard, a French Protestant woman, with whom he had nine children with the goal of "recreating the family he lost in the Holocaust. Five of them were subsequently employed within his companies; two met with tragedy, a three-year old daughter Karine died of leukemia; and his eldest son (at the time 15) Michael was severely injured after being driven home from a post Christmas party in 1961 when his driver fell asleep at the wheel. Michael never regained consciousness for the next seven years.

After the war, Maxwell first worked as a newspaper censor for the British military command in Berlin in Allied-occupied Germany. Later, he used various contacts in the Allied occupation authorities to go into business, becoming the British and United States distributor for Springer Verlag, a publisher of scientific books. In 1951 he bought three quarters of Butterworth-Springer, a minor publisher; the other one quarter was held by the experienced scientific editor Paul Rosbaud. They changed the name of the company to Pergamon Press and rapidly built it into a major publishing house. By the 1960s, Maxwell was a wealthy man, while still espousing in public the socialism of his youth. However, it would appear that he already had been identified as a problem for some people. An obituary for the Barclays banker Thomas Ashton states: "One Oxford resident who came to Ashton's attention was Robert Maxwell – to whom Ashton firmly forbade his managers to lend."

Member of Parliament

In 1964 he was elected to the House of Commons for the Labour Party, and was MP for Buckingham until he lost his seat in 1970 to the Conservative William Benyon. Maxwell was a prosecution witness in the obscenity case concerning the American novel Last Exit to Brooklyn in 1966. He enjoyed mixed popularity in the Labour Party, being perceived by some as arrogant and domineering, but also as a man who got things done. Then Prime Minister Harold Wilson stated, "It was quite clear from the outset that Bob would make his mark in the House of Commons, because he was a vigorous speaker with something to say."

In 1969 Saul Steinberg, a known asset stripper, who headed a company then known as Leasco Data Processing Corporation, was interested in a strategic acquisition of Pergamon. Steinberg claimed that during negotiations, Maxwell had falsely stated that a subsidiary responsible for publishing encyclopedias was extremely profitable. This led to a one-sided inquiry (Maxwell was never allowed to counter the claims or submit evidence on his behalf) by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) under the Takeover Code, then in force, and at the same time the U.S. Congress was investigating Leasco's takeover practices. The DTI report, which had no legal standing, concluded: "We regret having to conclude that, notwithstanding Mr Maxwell's acknowledged abilities and energy, he is not in our opinion a person who can be relied on to exercise proper stewardship of a publicly quoted company." It was found that Maxwell had contrived to maximise Pergamon's share price through transactions between his private family companies. This caused Maxwell to lose control of Pergamon in the United Kingdom—but not in the United States, whereupon Steinberg purchased Pergamon for a song. "Justice Forbes in September 1971 was critical of the inspectors, 'They had moved from an inquisitorial role to accusatory one and virtually committed the business murder of Mr. Maxwell." He further continued that the trial judge would probably find that the "inspectors had acted contrary to the rules of national justice."  Steinberg nearly bankrupted the company, and Maxwell, backed by his editors, resumed control of Pergamon, made it once again successful, and eventually sold the company.

Business activities

In 1970 Maxwell established the Maxwell Foundation in Liechtenstein. In 1974 he reacquired PPL. In 1981 Maxwell acquired the British Printing Corporation (BPC) and changed its name to the British Printing and Communication Corporation (BPCC) and then to Maxwell Communications Corporation. The company was later sold off to a management buy-out, and is now known as Polestar. In July 1984 Maxwell acquired Mirror Group Newspapers from Reed International plc. MGN were publishers of the Daily Mirror, a pro-Labour Party newspaper. He also bought the American interests of the Macmillan publishing house. The Mirror was the first National newspaper to be printed in color.

By the 1980s Maxwell's various companies owned the Daily Mirror, the Sunday Mirror, the Scottish Daily Record and Sunday Mail and several other newspapers, Pergamon Press, Nimbus Records, Collier books, Maxwell Directories, Prentice Hall Information Services, Macmillan (US) publishing, and the Berlitz language schools. He also owned a half-share of MTV in Europe and other European television interests, Maxwell Cable TV and Maxwell Entertainment. In 1987 Maxwell purchased part of IPC Media to create Fleetway Publications.

In June 1985, Maxwell announced a takeover of Sir Clive Sinclair's ailing home computer company, Sinclair Research, through Hollis Brothers, a Pergamon Press subsidiary. However the deal was aborted in August 1985.

Maxwell pioneered the dissemination of highly specialized scientific information, responding to the exponential growth of investment in academic research, and this is Maxwell's most important legacy. Maxwell founded over 600 specialized scientific and educational journals, which are an indispensable reference and research tool for the dissemination of scientific and educational thought throughout the world. By 1988 some 37 years after Maxwell acquired Pergamon Press, Maxwell's publishing empire had grown to having over 3500 books in print, including 7000 out-of-print titles, and was publishing some 400 scientific journals a year. At the same time, Maxwell's links with the Eastern European totalitarian regimes resulted in a number of biographies (normally considered to be hagiographies) of those countries' then leaders, with interviews conducted by Maxwell, for which, in the UK, he received much derision.

Maxwell was also well known as the chairman of Oxford United Football Club, saving them from bankruptcy and leading them into the top flight of English football, winning the League Cup in 1986. Maxwell bought into Derby County F.C. in 1987. He also attempted to buy Manchester United in 1984, but refused to pay the price that the owner Martin Edwards had put on the club.

Business difficulties

Maxwell was known to be litigious against those who would speak or write against him. The satirical magazine Private Eye lampooned him as a "Cap'n Bob" and the "bouncing Czech." Maxwell took out several libel actions against Private Eye, one resulting in the magazine losing an estimated £225,000 and Maxwell using his commercial power to hit back with Not Private Eye.

Most popular and newspaper accounts of Maxwell's life only focus on the last seven years of his life, after his acquisition of the Mirror Newspaper Group, when he embarked on a massive expansion of his business empire, which led to its eventual collapse after his sudden death. In the late 1980s, Maxwell was purchasing publishing companies and media properties at the very top of the market. In 1988, Maxwell purchased MacMillan Publishing for a staggering 2.6 billion dollars, which by some estimates was over three times its value. In 1990 he launched an ambitious new project, a transnational newspaper called The European. However, the following year he was forced to sell his successful Pergamon Press and Maxwell Directories to Elsevier for £440 million to cover his massive debts, but he used some of this money to buy the ailing New York Daily News. At the time, he was hailed in New York City as the man who "saved the Daily News."

By late 1990, investigative journalists, mainly from the rival Murdoch papers, were exploring Maxwell's manipulation of a lottery game he was running in the Daily Mirror.

Death

On 5 November 1991, at the age of 68, Maxwell is presumed to have fallen overboard from his luxury yacht, the Lady Ghislaine, which was cruising off the Canary Islands, and his body was subsequently found floating in the Atlantic Ocean. He was buried on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. The official verdict was accidental drowning, though some commentators have surmised that he may have committed suicide, and others that he was murdered. His death has spawned a whole cottage industry of conspiracy theories, which have little basis in fact.

Politicians were swift to pay their tributes. The then Prime Minister, John Major, said Maxwell had given him 'valuable insights' into the situation in the Soviet Union during the attempted coup. He was a 'great character', Major added. Neil Kinnock, the then Labour Party leader, spoke of the former Labour MP for Buckingham, from 1964–70, as a man with "such a zest for life . . . Bob Maxwell was a unique figure who attracted controversy, envy and loyalty in great measure throughout his rumbustious life. He was a steadfast supporter of the Labour Party". It was later alleged that Maxwell had been financing the Labour leader's private office and that Maxwell was an agent of MI6, the United Kingdom's Secret Intelligence Service.

Shortly before Maxwell's death, a former Mossad officer named Ari Ben-Menashe had approached a number of news organizations in Britain and the United States with the allegation that Maxwell and the Daily Mirror's foreign editor, Nick Davies, were both long time agents for the Israel intelligence service, Mossad. Ben-Menashe also claimed that in 1986 Maxwell had tipped off the Israeli Embassy in London that Mordechai Vanunu had given information about Israel's nuclear capability to the Sunday Times, then to the Daily Mirror, (Vanunu was subsequently lured from London, where the Sunday Times had him in hiding, to Rome, whence he was kidnapped and returned to Israel, convicted of treason, and imprisoned for 18 years.)

No news organization would publish Ben-Menashe's story at first, because of Maxwell's famed litigiousness (through lawyers Maislish & Co.), but eventually New Yorker journalist Seymour Hersh repeated some of the allegations during a press conference in London held to publicize The Samson Option, Hersh's book about Israel's nuclear weapons. On 21 October 1991, two Members of Parliament, Labour MP George Galloway and Conservative MP Rupert Allason (who writes books on the world of espionage under the pseudonym Nigel West) agreed to raise the issue in the House of Commons (with the protection of Parliamentary Privilege which allows MPs to ask questions in Parliament without risk of being sued for defamation), which in turn meant that British newspapers were able to report what had been said without fear of being sued for libel. Nevertheless, writs were swiftly issued by Mirror Group Solicitors on instruction from Maxwell, who called the claims "ludicrous, a total invention". Maxwell then sacked Nick Davies.

The close proximity of his death to these allegations, for which Ben-Menashe had offered no evidence, served to heighten interest in Maxwell's relationship with Israel, and the Daily Mirror has since published claims, again without evidence, that he was assassinated by Mossad after he attempted to blackmail them.

Maxwell was given a funeral in Israel better befitting a head of state than a publisher, as described by author Gordon Thomas:

On 10 November 1991, Maxwell’s funeral took place on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, across from the Temple Mount. It had all the trappings of a state occasion, attended by the country’s government and opposition leaders. No fewer than six serving and former heads of the Israeli intelligence community listened as Prime Minister Shamir eulogized: "He has done more for Israel than can today be said" (Gideon's Spies: The Secret History of the Mossad, St. Martin's Press, 1999).

A hint of Maxwell's service to the Israeli state was provided by Loftus and Aarons, who described Maxwell's contacts with Czech anti-Stalinist Communist leaders in 1948 as crucial to the Czech decision to arm Israel in their War of Independence that year. Czech military assistance was both unique and crucial for the fledgling state as it battled for its existence. It was Maxwell's covert help in smuggling aircraft parts into Israel that led to the Jewish state having air supremacy during their 1948 War of Independence. Nevertheless, Jewish leaders were additionally grateful for Maxwell's vital and material help in securing the freedom and immigration between 1988 -1991 of over one million Russian Jews through his friendship with Michel Gorbachev. Over 700 hundred thousand Russian Jews emigrated to Israel.

Events after his death

Maxwell's untimely death triggered a flood of instability with banks frantically calling in their massive loans. His two young sons Kevin and Ian struggled to hold the empire together, but were unable to prevent its collapse. It emerged that, without adequate prior authorisation, Maxwell had used hundreds of millions of pounds from his companies' pension funds to shore up the shares of the Mirror Group, to save his companies from bankruptcy. Eventually, the pension funds were replenished with monies from investment banks Shearson Lehman and Goldman Sachs, as well as the British government. After the death of Maxwell, the receivers of the Maxwell estate, instead of allowing an orderly sale of the Maxwell companies, allowed them to be sold at firesale prices. This meant that an enormous amount of money that could have reimbursed the pension fund were needlessly squandered.

The Maxwell companies filed for bankruptcy protection in 1992. His son, Kevin Maxwell was declared bankrupt with debts of £400 million. In 1995 Maxwell's sons Kevin and Ian and two other former directors went on trial for conspiracy to defraud, but were unanimously acquitted by a twelve man jury in 1996.

In 2008, Maxwell's wife published her memoirs, A Mind of Her Own, which sheds light on her life with Maxwell when the publishing magnate was ranked as one of the richest people in the world.

A BBC drama titled Maxwell covering his life shortly before his death starring David Suchet was aired on 4 May 2007. Maxwell, through his software company Mirrorsoft, played a role in the acquisition of the video game Tetris from its developers in the Soviet Union and its eventual marketing and sale in the West.