Facts & Figures

Cheaper. It looked as if the cost of food--the biggest component of the cost of living--was finally heading down. In its mid-September index of crop and livestock prices, the Department of Agriculture reported a three-point drop to 290 (1909-14 average: 100), the second drop in two months. The Journal of Commerce's wholesale food index also dropped half a point.

Prosperous Pennsy. The Pennsylvania Railroad Co., which had to dip into reserves last April to pay a 50-c- dividend, was doing well enough by the end of August to pay another 50-c- out of current earnings. Its eight months' net of $10,706,283 (v. a $4,666,689 loss in the same 1947 period) amounted to 81-c- a share.

Sharp Again. When the ball-point-pen boom collapsed, Eversharp, Inc. went into the red (TIME, May 24) and its stock dropped from 58 1/4 to a low of 7 3/4. Last week Eversharp was looking sharper. Chairman Martin L. Straus II reported a six-months net of $598,688, after taxes, v. $139,925 in the first half of 1947.

Henry Expands. Busily adding to his empire, Henry Kaiser announced a big deal to expand his Fontana steel mill. As usual, it was somewhat complicated. In return for $60 million worth of Fontana steel, the Transcontinental Gas Pipeline Co. (which plans an 1,840-mile natural-gas pipeline from Texas to New York) will help Kaiser finance a $17-million blast furnace to double Fontana's 1,200-ton daily capacity of pig iron.

Tuckered Tucker. Though Preston Tucker said he had made only 28 cars, he still had $8,446,206 in current assets (against $2,237,402 current liabilities), he told a U.S. district court in Chicago, in a stockholder's suit for receivership. But the biggest listed asset turned out to be $3,649,770 in promissory notes which Tucker dealers had signed to buy franchises. He listed only $1,888,749 in cash and Government bonds left, out of the approximate $20 million he had raised on stock and franchises.

Triplets. With its pint-sized auto, Crosley Motors, Inc. was turning in a jug-sized performance. President Powel Crosley Jr. reported that in twelve months sales ($25,391,627) had more than doubled, net earnings ($1,496,854) had tripled.

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