Kinney National Services, Inc. was formed in 1966 when the Kinney Parking Company

Kinney Parking Company

Kinney Parking Company was a New Jersey parking lot company owned by Manny Kimmel, Sigmund Dornbusch and mob figure Abner Zwillman. Prior to its public listing in 1960, it merged with a funeral home company, Riverside, and then expanded into car-rentals, office cleaning firms and construction...

 and the National Cleaning Company merged. The new company was headed by Steve Ross

Steve Ross (Time-Warner CEO)

Steve Jay Ross was CEO of Time Warner Inc., Warner Communications, and Kinney National Services, Inc.-Early life and career:...

.

Kinney National expanded in 1967 by acquiring National Periodical Publications (more commonly, but not yet officially called DC Comics

DC Comics

DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...

), Hollywood talent agency Ashley-Famous

Ashley-Famous

Ashley-Famous was a talent agency started in 1951 by talent agent Ted Ashley. The agency had a successful 16 year run under that name and owner; it was responsible for many hit television shows and had several famous clients...

, and then Panavision

Panavision

Panavision is an American motion picture equipment company specializing in cameras and lenses, based in Woodland Hills, California. Formed by Robert Gottschalk as a small partnership to create anamorphic projection lenses during the widescreen boom in the 1950s, Panavision expanded its product...

. Also that same year, Warner Bros.-Seven Arts purchased Atlantic Records

Atlantic Records

Atlantic Records is an American record label best known for its many recordings of rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and jazz...

. Ted Ashley

Ted Ashley

Ted Ashley was the chairman of the Warner Bros. film studio from 1969 to 1980.He was born in Brooklyn as Theodore Assofsky. At the age of 20 he started out as a William Morris agent...

 (from Ashley-Famous) suggested to Ross that he buy out the cash-strapped film company Warner Bros.-Seven Arts

Warner Bros.-Seven Arts

Warner Bros.-Seven Arts was formed in 1967 and became defunct in 1970, when Seven Arts Productions acquired Jack Warner's controlling interest in Warner Bros. for $32 million and merged with it. The deal also included Warner Bros. Records, Reprise Records and the B&W Looney Tunes library...

. When the acquisition of Warner Bros.-Seven Arts was completed in 1969, Ashley-Famous was sold because of anti-trust laws prohibiting a company from owning both a production studio and a talent agency. Ted Ashley was put in charge of the movie studio. Beginning with the unexpected success of the concert documentary Woodstock (1970), the company started scoring box office hits again, reestablishing Warner Bros.

Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 as a major studio. In 1970, Kinney National bought Jac Holzman

Jac Holzman

Jac Holzman was the founder, chief executive officer and head of both Elektra Records and Nonesuch Records.-Biography:He founded Elektra Records in his St. John's College dorm room in 1950 and Nonesuch Records in 1964...

's Elektra Records

Elektra Records

Elektra Records is an American record label owned by Warner Music Group. In 2004, it was consolidated into WMG's Atlantic Records Group. After five years of dormancy, the label was revived by Atlantic in 2009....

 and Nonesuch Records

Nonesuch Records

Nonesuch Records is an American record label, owned by Warner Music Group and distributed by Warner Bros. Records.-Company history:Nonesuch was founded in 1964 by Jac Holzman to produce "fine records at the same price as a trade paperback", which would be half the price of a normal LP...

.

Due to a financial scandal over its parking operations, Kinney National spun off its non-entertainment assets in 1971 (as National Kinney Corporation) and changed its own name to Warner Communications Inc.

Warner Communications

Warner Communications or Warner Communications, Inc. was established in 1971 when Kinney National Company spun off its non-entertainment assets, due to a financial scandal over its parking operations and changed its name....

 with Steve Ross

Steve Ross (Time-Warner CEO)

Steve Jay Ross was CEO of Time Warner Inc., Warner Communications, and Kinney National Services, Inc.-Early life and career:...

 as the company's sole CEO, president and chairman. Directors included Charles A. Agemian

Charles A. Agemian

Charles A. Agemian was a nationally known Armenian-American banker who took early retirement from Chase Manhattan Bank, where he was executive vice president of operations, to become chairman and chief executive officer of the Hackensack Trust Co., which later was renamed Garden State National...

, the CEO of Garden State National Bank

Garden State National Bank

Garden State National Bank was a mid-size commercial bank located in northern New Jersey that enjoyed success in the increasingly wealthy New Jersey suburbs of New York City during the 1970s. The significant media coverage it received during that period was more due to the various M&A transactions...

.