Getting Under Way

A preparatory hum spread through the U. S. last week. Army arsenals at Rock Island, 111., Augusta, Ga., Benicia, Calif., Frankford, Pa., Dover, N. J., Metuchen, N. J.; San Antonio, Tex., Springfield, Mass., Watertown, Mass., Watervliet, N. Y., Edgewood, Md., were put on a six-day week. Two shipbuilders (Bath Iron Works Corp., Federal Shipbuilding & Dry-dock Co.) bid-o build destroyers in 18 months instead A 24. The Du Fonts ar ranged to build and operate a big powder plant financed by the French and British (see p. 79). Chrysler Corp. was ready to produce bomb fuses, shell forgings. was prepared to convert plant space of World War I vintage to other munitions production. Aged (73) Tank-Designer Walter Christie popped up in Washington with plans for a tank to be hooked to an airplane and landed ready for combat. Aircraftsman Glenn Martin in Baltimore declared that all the established industry needs to get into real mass production is mass orders. Two men in charge of the dynamo whence all this humming proceeded were a white-haired young man named Edward R. Stettinius Jr. and a Danish, cat-stepping giant named William S. Knudsen.

Every morning at 8, Mr. Stettinius strode into the lobby of Washington's stately, white-marble Federal Reserve Building, hurried upstairs to a cool office. Usually he did not leave before 10 p.m. Mr. Stettinius last week quit his $100,000 a-year chairmanship of U. S. Steel to take the payless, possibly thankless job of supplying the raw materials for steeling the U. S. In an identical upstairs office sat Mr. Knudsen, who was last week given leave of absence from the presidency of General Motors Corp., to see that finished planes, guns, uniforms, shells, etc., are turned out at maximum speed and efficiency.

To Messrs. Stettinius & Knudsen went the big, full-time jobs. Most of their fellow commissioners also moved in last week. Sloe-eyed, calm-mouthed Dean Harriet Elliott of the University of North Carolina conferred with Federal officials interested in her job of consumer protection. Net impression about her job was that, for the moment, its functions will be delightfully vague. Agriculturist Chester C. Davis got a capable assistant, Paul Porter of CBS, publicly did little else. Railroader Ralph Budd (transportation) was heard to remark that he faced only one problem: an excess of facilities. Labor Overseer Sidney Hillman was still ill. Fulltime U. S. officials who are to share his job (mobilizing trained man power where it is needed) buzzed ahead without him on plans to train 1,000.000 civilians, find immediately needed craftsmen, school 45,000 civilian pilots for a year (through CAA). Hulking Leon Henderson kept his SEC office; he can watch price trends as well from one place as another.

"It is pretty certain that there will be some action," said Leon Henderson, after the board conferred last week with Franklin Roosevelt. Preliminary action there was, and of a kind to please U. S. businessmen. From Mr. Stettinius, the President ordered a thorough overhaul of the complex, tape-bound Federal procurement setup. Franklin ("I'm the boss") Roosevelt eased Secretary of the Treasury Morgen: thau out of Mr. Knudsen's way, giving him a free hand to tackle his enormous task of upping aircraft and aircraft-engine production to the still astronomical figure of 50,000 a year. Also promised to Commissioner Knudsen was authority to oversee and coordinate the letting of important contracts for Army-Navy equipment. For assistance, which he will sorely need, Mr. Knudsen last week drafted Libbey-Owens-Ford Glass Co.'s able President John David Biggers, one of the few industrialists in whom Franklin Roosevelt has displayed confidence. Another recruit was handsome Publicityman Bob Horton, who duly introduced himself to Mr. Knudsen.

"Can you build a tank?" inquired William Knudsen, without looking up from his desk.

"No," gulped Mr. Horton.

"Then I won't be seeing much of you," said Mr. Knudsen in dismissal.

Rearmament hero -of -the -week was Henry Ford. Last fortnight Mr. Ford predicted in an interview that, with expert assistance, he could produce 1,000 planes a day. Last week Mr. Ford asked the War Department to send him a typical Army airplane and somebody to explain it to him. This week a swift (370 m.p.h.), single-engined Curtiss P-4O was flown to Detroit, there to be gone over by Henry Ford's bright old eyes. If he puts his mind to it, Henry Ford probably can produce planes in quantity; he certainly can produce aircraft engines. This week he announced that Ford Motor Co. is going to turn out a British (Rolls-Royce type) liquid-cooled motor for the U. S.

More cautiously General Motors' Acting President C. E. Wilson declared: ". . .

The automobile industry will be expected to manufacture mainly things on wheels, and engines. . . . The men who have been building airplanes for the last 20 years, however, can do a better job [with air craft] than we can".

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