Business: In Los Angeles

At the head of the list is Walter Hull Aldridge, president of Texas Gulf Sulphur Co. At the bottom is American Radiator’s Clarence Mott Woolley. In between are only some 85 other names but all are potent in U. S. business. They bring potency to the National Foreign Trade Council whose membership they form. For the most part the Council works silently but effectively on the problems of trade and its encouragement, but once a year it holds an open Convention, invites all who would like to hear problems discussed, experiences narrated. Last week the 17th annual Foreign Trade Council convention was held in Los Angeles, drew 3,000 businessmen.

¶ First speaker was Chairman James Augustine Farrell, president of U.S. Steel and leading spirit of the council. Predicting greater business volume soon, he commented on the rising proportion of manufactured goods in exports, found significance in the fact that last year’s gain was “achieved in precisely that element of our trade that is directly responsible to merchandising skill and enterprise.”

¶ “In the teeth of frequent disturbances during the last 20 years,” said Henry K. Chang, Chinese Consul-General at San Francisco, “China’s trade with the U. S. has grown apace.”

¶ Henry F. Grady, Dean of the College of Commerce, University of California, lamented the lack of positions for college-trained foreign traders.

¶ “Just try to think of Asia in terms of the machinery she uses as compared with the machinery we use,” demanded R. J. Cromie, publisher of the Vancouver Sun. “Canada and the United States use about $23.60 worth of machinery per individual; England comes next with about $11. . . . In China, India and Java the amount of machinery would not run over 30 or 40 cents per individual.”