Newport Beach hotelier honored

Andrew Edwards

After more than a half century since he started working, the Balboa

Bay Club & Resort’s Henry Schielein returned to his native Germany to

be honored as a standout in the hotel industry.

Schielein, 70, was named “One of the Finest Hoteliers Worldwide”

by the New York City-based American Academy of Hospitality Sciences.

He received the honor March 5 at the group’s award ceremony in

Berlin.

The academy grants prestigious awards to luxury hotels worldwide,

as well as professionals in the hospitality industry. The award

received by Schielein is given to respected general managers in the

business. He was the only person to receive the honor in 2005.

“In such a modern world Mr. Henry Schielein manages to possess all

the old world standards of heading such a impeccable establishment --

elegance, class, sophistication and above all true leadership,”

academy president Joseph Cinque said in an e-mail.

Cinque nominated Schielein for the award, which was approved by

the academy’s board of trustees.

Schielein started his stint as president of the Balboa Bay Club in

1994, before the club’s resort was built.

He landed his first job in the hotel business in 1949, working as a 14-year-old “glorified bus boy” at the Berchtesgadener Hof in the

Bavarian Alps. Before the fall of the Third Reich, Nazi dictator

Adolf Hitler kept a retreat at Berchtesgaden, but by the time

Schielein worked there, the hotel served American officers.

“When I worked there, we had all the top brass of the U.S. Army;

we had General Eisenhower, Lucius Clay, you name it,” Schielein said.

During his return to Europe, Schielein skied the slopes of Austria

and enjoyed a drink with his son Ryan in Munich, Schielein’s

hometown.

“I took my son to the Hofbrauhaus, and we had a liter beer

together,” Schielein said.

Work has taken Schielein all over the world. In 1960, he was hired

by Hilton Hotels and ended up managing resorts in Hawaii, Hong Kong,

Manila and Bangkok. After other moves, Schielein in 1986 went to the Ritz-Carlton Laguna Niguel, which -- after Schielein joined it --

garnered two of the top rankings in the hotel business, the Mobil

Travel Guide Five-Star Award and the American Automobile Assn.’s Five

Diamond Award.

The Balboa Bay Club & Resort, which opened its public hotel in

2003, has not reached that level of acclaim. In 2004, the hotel

earned a four-diamond ranking from the American Automobile Assn. and

the academy’s International Star Diamond Award. The resort has yet to

be evaluated by Mobil.

So far, the hotel’s owners are pleased with Schielein’s work.

“We’re doing great, and a lot of that’s due to Henry,” said David

Wooten, president of International Bay Clubs, Inc., the company that

owns the hotel.