William S. Paley - Other Interests

Other Interests

In the 1940s, William Paley and Dr. Leon Levy formed Jaclyn Stable, which owned and raced a string of thoroughbred race horses. Paley formed a modern art collection with as many as 40 major works, and he enjoyed photographing Picasso in Cap d'Antibes. Like Picasso, Paley drove an exotic French Facel Vega Facel II, the fastest four-seater car in the world in the early 1960s.

In 1964, CBS purchased the New York Yankees from the Del Webb Company. Subsequently, the storied baseball team fell into mediocrity, not making the postseason for the next ten years. In 1973, Paley sold the team at its low ebb for $8.7 million to Cleveland shipbuilder George Steinbrenner and a group of investors. In April 2006, Forbes Magazine estimated that the Yankees were worth $1.26 billion.