Personnel

Last week the following were news:

P:More than a coincidence is the fact that International Harvester's active head has always been a Scotsman. Its managerial traditions are tight-lipped accounting and long-headed efficiency. Its annual report usually concludes with a tribute to the "zeal," "courage," "loyalty" or "resourcefulness" of its organization. After the sons and grandsons of the late great Cyrus Hall McCormick began to lavish their energies on personal affairs, Alexander Legge took command. When Mr. Legge died in 1933, right at hand was a faithful first vice president whose sober Scotch virtues had raised him from the stock room--Addis Emmet McKinstry-Last week Mr. McKinstry retired because of ill health, and Harvester's direc-tors--four of whom are McCormicks-- again reached down for a first vice president whose qualifications included his Scotch name. Now 65, President Sydney George McAllister got his Harvester start in the traditional Harvester way-- as an office boy. Climbing slowly to an executive job in Harvester's European division, he spent 17 years in Brussels, was called home in 1931. Cool, steady, suspicious of the Press like all crack Harvester officials, he lives quietly with his wife and son in Highland Park outside Chicago, seldom entertains.

P: Most people had never heard of Canada Dry ginger ale and the U. S. pop business had no chic when, in 1923, Parry Borland Saylor became head of the U. S. branch of Canada Dry Co. of Canada. A sharp, aggressive onetime tire salesman, he made his product look as much like a champagne bottle as possible (green glass, gold-foil collar), went after the public with a svelte and costly advertising campaign. The results so astounded his Canadian bosses that they sold the parent company to him on the spot. But Parry Dorland Saylor soon struck a snag. He wanted control of a minority interest owned by four rich young Manhattan socialites including John Wanamaker Jr. and William Rhinelander Stewart Jr. The young men slept all morning, went to parties in the evening, could not be brought together in one place in the afternoon. Aleman Saylor worked nearly four months before he got them into a hotel room one midnight, made them sign. Mr. Saylor became president, general manager, largest stockholder of Canada Dry.

Last week Mr. Saylor, whose latest undertaking was to put Canada Dry into the liquor business, resigned his presidency, will continue as chairman. Under an amendment to the company's bylaws, the board chairman is to become chief executive and financial officer, the president chief operating officer. Elected president was Roy W. Moore, handsome, sociable, longtime vice president in charge of operations.

Canada Dry's March quarter earnings dropped to $60,000 from $103,000 last year. Reason: unprofitable liquor business, dwindling ginger ale sales.

C. In his 43 years Bernard E. ("Sell 'Em Ben") Smith has been a $9-a-week brokers' clerk in Manhattan, fight promoter in Great Britain, biggest bear since Jesse Livermore, greatest bull since William Crapo Durant. The commodity in which he is always bearish is hooey. Every time President Hoover and Dr. Julius Klein said things were going to get better in 1930, the profane, pale-eyed Irishman unloaded his stocks. ("Sell 'em," said he. "They're not worth anything.") The commodity in which Ben Smith is always bullish is gold. Only U. S. director of Mclntyre Porcupine gold mines, he has a large stake in Alaska Juneau, carries a miniature gold brick in his vest pocket. Ben Smith has other loves, including shellac, white pepper and New York Ship-building Co. Last week Wall Street was not surprised to learn that Ben Smith had also taken a flier in biscuits.

George Weston Ltd. of Toronto is a small, ambitious baking company with half a dozen plants in Canada, Scotland and the U. S. Conservatively capitalized with 182,000 shares of preferred and common stock, it has a sound, steady earnings record. Few years ago when Weston Ltd.'s youthful President Garfield Weston arrived in the U. S. seeking fresh capital, bankers were cold to his argument that Depression is the time to expand. But Ben Smith often invests in companies because he likes their personnel, and he liked Garfield Weston. At some indeterminate date, for an unrevealed price, Ben Smith bought a block of Weston stock. Last week he was bullish enough on biscuits to do something he has rarely done: accept an executive position. He became Weston Ltd.'s board chairman.

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