National Affairs: McDONALD’S OPPOSITE NUMBER

Dave McDonald’s principal opponent in the steel negotiations: John A. (for Allen) Stephens, 61, vice president in charge of industrial relations for U.S. Steel Corp.

Family & Early Years: Born May 1, 1895 in Albany, N.Y., where his father, John A. Stephens, was a law partner of New York’s Governor (and U.S. Senator) David B. Hill. After grade and elementary school in Albany, entered Connecticut’s Wesleyan University, transferred after his junior year to the newly organized School of Business at Columbia University (B.A., 1917). In 1918 married Mary Elizabeth Lathrop; they have two daughters, four grandchildren.

Business Career: Left college in the spring of 1917 to enter the U.S. Army, emerged from service as a field artillery major. Worked for four different companies, ranging from construction to rubber products, “took a licking” in the 1929 crash, wound up in 1932 as president of the Bush Terminal Co., Brooklyn. He resigned, stony-broke, when Bush went bankrupt in 1933, and cast about for “something fundamental” to get into. Something fundamental proved to be steel, and in 1934, at 39, he became a “sales student” at the Gary works of Illinois Steel. Rising rapidly, he became manager of industrial relations of the Chicago district for Carnegie-Illinois Steel in 1935, three years later moved to Pittsburgh to take on the job of director of industrial relations for another U.S. Steel subsidiary, was named vice president of that company in 1943. He began negotiating with the Steelworkers in 1941, has kept at it more or less steadily ever since.

Personality: Reticent, honest, quick-witted, forthright and cool, he is smallish (5 ft. 7½ in.), a conservative dresser and the possessor of a deep bass voice and a dry, often penetrating wit. Unostentatious, he drives to his Pittsburgh office from his home in Sewickley, Pa. in a 1954 two-door Ford, likes to watch baseball games. Hobbies: golf, fishing and photographing his grandchildren. Bargainer Stephens’ definition of the requirements of his job: “To be a skilled negotiator takes character, integrity, quick wit, a keen mind, the ability to speak as the moment requires−with humor, sincerity, pathos and also some grounding in economics.”