Who's What at G.M.

At the Bloomfield Hills Country Club-social GHQ of the auto industry elite--the seasonal small talk about football shifted abruptly last week to an even more popular sport: guessing who will be the next president and who the next chairman of General Motors. G.M. itself kicked off the speculation with an intriguing round of promotions among its top officials. Upward bound:

> JAMES E. GOODMAN. 56. moved from group vice president in charge of G.M.'s body and assembly division to executive vice president in charge of the automotive, body and assembly, and parts divisions.

> EDWARD N. COLE, 52. vice president and general manager of the Chevrolet division, was named to the newly created post of group vice president in charge of all car and truck divisions. Cole, whose new job ranks just below Goodman's, was also elected to the G.M. board and the all-important executive committee.

> SEMON E. ("Bunky") KNUDSEN, 49, son of late G.M. President William S. Knudsen, and previously vice president and general manager of the Pontiac division, shifted into Cole's job at Chevrolet --one that his father held for nine years.

> ELLIOTT M. ("Pete") ESTES, 45, Pontiac chief engineer since 1956, moved into front-line management by taking over Knudsen's post at Pontiac.

With customary inscrutability, G.M. itself offered no explanation for its moves, so the field was clear for non-G.M. auto executives to guess at their meaning. Most concluded that Cole and Knudsen are now in competition to succeed President John F. Gordon, 61, when Gordon reaches mandatory retirement age in four years.

More Models Faster. Age, Detroit pundits reason, militates against Goodman's going much higher in the G.M. hierarchy because he will be close to retirement himself in four years. A barrel-chested outgoing life of the party, Goodman started at G.M. 36 years ago on the assembly line, worked his way to the top through the Fisher Body and Buick-Oldsmobile-Pontiac assembly divisions. His biggest contribution: cutting the time it takes to develop a new model from more than three years to less than two.

Cole (TIME cover, Oct. 5, 1959) is generally rated a slight favorite over Knudsen in the presidential stakes. A rare combination of engineer and articulate salesman, Cole learned his engineering at General Motors Institute, the company engineering school, was chief engineer at Cadillac and then Chevrolet before he took over Chevy in 1956. He directed the development of the Corvette sports car and the Corvair air-cooled, rear-engine compact. Last year, introducing Detroit to the sales potential of pizazz with his chromed-up Monza, Cole whipped Chevy to record sales of 1,730,000--the most for any car in history.

For Maiden Aunts. Knudsen in personality and record is a subdued version of Cole. He came out of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1936, joined G.M. three years later. After hitches in the automotive, aircraft and diesel engine manufacturing divisions, he took over Pontiac in 1956 when it was looked on as a car good only for maiden aunts. Knudsen ripped off Pontiac's traditional chrome streaks, pepped up its engine and gave it gimmick features ("wide track." split grille). Result: while other medium-priced cars continued to slide, Pontiac jumped from sixth place in sales into a fight with Rambler for third. Knudsen's move to Chevy will give G.M. kingmakers a chance to measure him with the same yardstick they held up to Cole.

Should the presidency go to either Engineer Cole or Engineer Knudsen, the chairman's job most likely would fall to a financial man in the tradition of present Chairman Frederic G. Donner, 59. Leading contenders at the moment: George Russell, 56, executive vice president for finance, and Vice President Richard C. Gerstenberg, 51, Russell's immediate subordinate. But for all participants in the great Detroit guessing game, one G.M. official last week had an amused warning: "Whatever you guess, no matter how logical, the odds are you're going to be wrong."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.