Howard or Bob?

Howard Hughes climbed into his plane last week and flew down to San Diego, where Atlas Corp.'s Floyd Odium was inspecting Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corp., one of Atlas' properties. Hughes was interested in another Atlas Corp. property: RKO. Since the dark days of 1935 when RKO and its chain of theaters were deep in the red, Atlas had gradually bought up 929,020 RKO shares, a controlling (24%) interest. Atlas Corp.'s management, and the war, had put RKO healthily into the black. Now Odium wanted to get out and take his profit.

For an hour Hughes dickered with Odium about buying Atlas' RKO holdings. The best guess about the price: around $8,000,000. Then Hughes flew back to his Beverly Hills home to make up his mind. To the press Odium complained: "Under today's almost panicky conditions in Hollywood (TIME, Jan. 19) [no one] has the combined money and nerve to meet the faith of Atlas Corp. in the industry."

But there was another buyer eying RKO last week who had never lacked nerve, and usually found the money. Railroader Robert R. Young had not been too pleased with his Eagle Lion Films Inc. His films, mostly Bs, had not impressed either the critics or the public. Young thought the cure was a chain of theaters, better production and a better distributing organization. (All this may also help British Cinemogul J. Arthur Rank, who now has a distributing agreement with Eagle Lion.) Last week, Young liked the idea of buying RKO enough to announce:

"A group of private investors associated with me have been looking into RKO and United Artists with a view toward a possible investment."

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