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Heringer, supporter of Catholic schools, dies
By TOM LUTEY
Of The Gazette Staff

Oil and gas man Chuck Heringer, longtime benefactor of Billings charities and past Montana chairman of George H.W. Bush's presidential campaigns, died early this week from congestive heart failure.

He was 84.

"It's a big loss for the community of Billings," said Roy Brown, a friend and 2008 Republican candidate for governor. "He was involved in just about every charitable event that went on in this town, especially the Catholic schools."


'Concerned with what's right'
Heringer was in the process of raising $1 million for the parochial schools when he died, said his oldest son, Bucky. He was a little over halfway there. "He was doing it from his room out in The Vista nursing home, calling people and putting the hammer on them, trying to get them to commit." Bucky Heringer said.

Heringer had a way of getting people to give back to their community, often by telling them he'd already put them down for $500 and expecting them to honor the pledge. Brown remembers Heringer pressing him into covering a portion of the underground sprinkler costs for the Central High practice field. He expected people to do the right thing.

"Chuck was never shy in expressing his thoughts, feelings or desires," said Fred Morganthaler, a longtime friend. "He was concerned with political correctness. He was concerned with what's right."


Never forgot a friend
In the late 1980s, Heringer was concerned about Morganthaler, who had recently lost his job to a slumping oil economy.

Morganthaler was working at the Cenex refinery, where he was an accountant and later a pipeline superintendent.

With oil prices faltering, Cenex laid off Morganthaler's pipeline crew. He began sending out his resume to anyone he could think of, without much luck.

That's when Morganthaler's son's Boy Scout troop toured Heringer's oil and gas company while working on their business merit badges. Heringer asked each boy what their fathers did for a living. When Fred Morganthaler II informed Heringer that his dad was an out-of-work refinery employee, Heringer told the boy to have Morganthaler give him a call.

"I was floating résumés all over the country and there was just nothing out there and my son comes home from Scouts and said, 'I got something for you.' I said, 'Did you get your badge or what?' He said, 'No, I got you a job.' "

Heringer didn't have a lot of full-time work to offer, but he hired Morganthaler to straighten out his accounting with the promise that the new hire would be able to network a little and maybe find something better. Morganthaler eventually landed a job with United Oil Products of Chicago. But for the next 18 years, he did Heringer's accounting in his spare time. When he retired from United Oil Products two years ago, he returned to Heringer's company, Herco, to help the man who gave him a hand up.

Heringer never forgot a friend. Working in the Texas oil fields in 1950, he met George Herbert Walker Bush. They were young men chasing oil profits. They played for the same community football team, the Midland Misfits. Heringer, who had been recruited by Notre Dame to play football, quarterbacked the Misfits. Bush was a receiver.

One of the few single men in their social circle, Heringer baby-sat the Bush children when George and his wife, Barbara, wanted a night out.

Years later, when Bush ran for president, Heringer wrote him a letter, offering to do anything he could to help. Bush made Heringer chairman of his Montana campaign.

Later, Heringer and his wife, Marynell, became White House guests and it was always a joke among Heringer's seven children that although their father was the president's friend, it was Marynell that got seated at the president's dining table, usually with important heads of state. Chuck Heringer sat at the back of the room.

"I thought the world of Chuck Heringer, and Barbara and I are deeply saddened by his passing," the former president said in a written statement Wednesday. "In politics, Chuck was a loyal supporter who stood by my side through good times and bad. But most importantly, Chuck was our family friend of longstanding - and we Bushes will truly miss him."

When Marynell Heringer died June 4, 2000, the Bushes wrote Heringer with their condolences. Heringer liked to host political functions at his house. Bucky remembers Bob Dole being at his father's home once for a fundraiser for former U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns. He served as Roy Brown's treasurer during Brown's legislative campaigns.

In a written statement, Montana Republican Party Chairwoman Alden Downing said, "We are saddened by the news of Chuck's passing. He was a good friend and role model to many of us and served the people of Montana with a dedication and vigor which all Republicans should strive to emulate. His participation on a local, statewide and national scale has provided a template for civic responsibility for those affiliated with all political and social groups. Chuck will be sincerely missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends."

At Heringer's request, his vigil and funeral Mass have been postponed until his grandchildren complete their final school examinations and return to Billings.