Catalog industry veteran Walter Drake, who ran the Walter Drake and Sons company for half a century, died of natural causes Saturday at his home. He was 80.
“He was always thinking, and he would try anything,” his grandson, Tim Wiseman, told The Gazette of Colorado Springs. “He would always have a little notepad and be constantly jotting down ideas.”
Drake was shot twice in the back while being mugged in downtown Colorado Springs in 1968. He spent the rest of his life in a wheelchair.
He employed 365 full- and part-time workers in the mid-1990s. However, the business was losing money, according to the newspaper, and in 1997 he sold it to Foster & Gallagher.
“After 50 years, wouldn't you?” Drake said at that time.
Walter Drake and Sons became profitable and was sold at auction for $15 million when the parent company filed for bankruptcy in 2001.
