PERSONALITIES

THE first thing soft-spoken Floyd D. Hall did when he moved into the president's office at Eastern Airlines last month was to hang his framed TWA pilot's wings and captain's stripes on the wall. The act was symbolic; only a few days later, Captain Eddie Rickenbacker retired after 26 years as Eastern president, and later chairman, leaving Hall in complete command. Hall, 47, is already reshaping Eastern from top to bottom, stressing detailed economic planning, improved cabin service, and a hard sell to win more passengers. Though the line has lost $41.5 million in the past four years, former Pilot Hall has impressive experience in pulling out of nose dives. As TWA's general manager, he played a key role in transforming that line into a big moneymaker. He is counting heavily on Eastern's employees to help him out. "In an uncertain situation like this," says Hall, "people are hungry for someone to tell them what to do. Once they understand what they are supposed to do, they are willing to work over their heads."

AT 44, Robert L. Gibson is the youngest president in the 96-year history of Chicago-based Libby, Mc-Neill & Libby, one of the world's biggest food canners and freezers. Libby's sales had been declining for four years when energetic, cigar-chomping Bob Gibson took over in 1962 (he had never worked for another company), but his infusion of young ideas into the company has set it off on a steady rise ever since. Gibson shook up a whole roster of vice presidents, increased the authority of divisional managers, applied scientific research to marketing Libby's 300 products (best seller: tomato juice). He feels that the best place for Libby to regain its youth is in Western Europe, where rising living standards provide a growing market for canned goods. Libby will add a $5,000,000 cannery in the Rhone Valley this year to already operating processing plants in West Germany and England (three major European firms now hold 40% of Libby's stock). Gibson travels a lot, but still taste-tests his products and approves the label for each canned product.

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