Business: Draft on Business

This week to Washington went Princetonman James Vincent Forrestal, after turning in his resignation as president of the top-flight Wall Street investment house of Dillon, Read & Co. His new job: No. 4 of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s $10,000-a-year administrative assistants “with a passion for anonymity.” In the reforming New Deal of 1939, Wall Streeter Forrestal’s appointment would have set alienists to wondering. In the war-defense New Deal of 1940’s summer it got only passing notice. For against the possibility of war, Franklin Roosevelt’s draft on business was already functioning. To implement his Defense Advisory Commission, many a high-pay U. S. businessman was already hard at work in the Capital at a salary of $1 a year.

Most active in drawing on businessmen was silver-haired Ed Stettinius, who chucked his $100,000 job as board chairman of United States Steel Corp. to take charge of the raw materials section of the commission. Included in his staff are:

Onetime Yale Crewman Charles Edward Adams, chairman of Air Reduction Co., and of U. S. Industrial Alcohol Co. His job: Ed Stettinius’ senior assistant.

Philadelphia Republican William Loren Batt, president of S. K. F. Industries, Inc.

(bearings), president of the International Committee of Scientific Management.

William Casement Bower, vice president of New York Central System. His job: procurement studies.

Gano Dunn, president of J. G. White Engineering Corp. and Cooper Union, recipient of many a scientific award in electrical engineering and holder of 30-odd patents.

Samuel Hood Dolbear, globe-trotting mining engineer. His job: chromium specialist.

Marion Bayard Fohom, treasurer of Eastman Kodak Co.

Amiable, hawk-nosed Clarence Francis, president of big General Foods Corp. (at $108,000 in 1938).

Polo-playing William Averell Harriman, board chairman of Union Pacific Railroad, partner in Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. (private bankers). His job: liaison between Stettinius and Burlington’s Ralph Budd, the commission’s transportation man.

Thomas Bayard McCabe, president of Scott Paper Co.

Dr. David Percy Morgan, chemical economist for Wall Street Investment Counselors Scudder, Stevens & Clark.

Allen Waller Morton, vice president of Koppers Co.

Robert Ten Broeck Stevens, president of J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., Manhattan textile sales house.

Howard Calvin Sykes, depression president of the New York Curb Exchange, a specialist on mica.

Walter Sheldon Tower, successor of Ernest Tener Weir as president of American Iron and Steel Institute. His job: consultant on the steel industry.

Dr. Edward Ray Weidlein, internationally famed director of the Mellon Institute, chemical engineer, and World War I member of the War Industries Board.

Dr. Robert Erastus Wilson, balding, science-wise president of Pan-American Petroleum & Transport Co.. holder of 88 chemical and engineering patents. Meanwhile, in the production side of the commission, hulking William S. Knudsen, on leave from the presidency of General Motors, has also reached into business.

Among members of his staff: John David Diggers, president of Libbey-Owens-Ford Glass Co.; Knudsen’s executive assistant.

E. F. Johnson, former parts and accessories expert for General Motors; in full charge of ordnance production.

Dr. George Jackson Mead, until recently vice president of United Aircraft Corp., and since boss of engine research for National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics.

Harold Sines Vance, broad-shouldered board chairman of Studebaker Corp.; in charge of machine-tool production.