AVIATION: Revolt Tripped

It was the annual meeting of Pan American Airways stockholders. Up rose Juan Terry Trippe. Pan Am had done well in the first five months of this year, said he cheerfully. It had grossed $27,500,000 against last year’s $17,000,000. But in the future, said Juan Trippe smoothly, Pan Am would not have the services of two top officials: Thomas Alfred Morgan, board chairman of Sperry Corp. and former head of Pan Am’s executive committee, and Samuel Sloan Colt, president of Manhattan’s Bankers Trust Co. They had declined to stand for re-election as directors.

Juan Trippe did not explain why, but the reason leaked out. For the second time in eight years, there had been a revolt against Trippe’s one-man rule of Pan Am. And, for the second time, Juan Trippe had won out.

Back in 1939, Pan Am’s directors, led by Board Chairman Cornelius Vanderbilt (“Sonny”) Whitney, staged the first revolt. They had forced Trippe to give up some of his power, and to agree to appoint an executive vice president to take charge of Pan Am’s flying operations. The peacemakers at that time were Colt and Morgan.

Tom Morgan is a shrewd, even-tempered aviation expert whose simple success formula is: “The way to get things done is to get along with people.” This time he was the man who had not been able to get along with Trippe. He had felt that Trippe was hurting Pan Am by: 1) going back on his promise to hire a top operating man; 2) plumping for his monopolistic Chosen Instrument.

To try to bring Trippe to heel, Tom Morgan teamed up with Banker Colt, (Another board member, Manhattan banker & Hearstman John Wesley Hanes, was in, then out of the cabal.) They argued that Pan Am’s fortunes were at a low point politically. Trippe’s Chosen Instrument talk had so stirred up the Administration that even President Truman had stepped in to make sure that Pan Am would have plenty of competition (TIME, June 3).

In short, they said, Pan Am no longer had a monopoly in Latin America and Juan Trippe could no longer run things as he pleased; if Pan Am did not adjust to the new conditions, the air ahead was going to be bumpier than ever.

Unable to persuade Trippe, Morgan and Colt got out. That made everything simple. Juan Trippe once again took over the whole caboodle of Pan Am’s top jobs (acting board chairman, president, and chairman of the executive committee). His monopoly over his airline was once again complete.