No Solution at Curtis

Without comment, Curtis Publishing Co. last week released some statistical bad news: its nine-month report. The figures showed that through September, Curtis had an operating loss of $8,000,000-a deficit substantial enough to assure the publishing house its fourth straight year in the red. To add to its troubles, there is the editorial rebellion that for more than a month has occupied the attention of the Curtis board.

As if all that were not enough, Curtis management is also embroiled in a suit brought by a minority stockholder who has charged that stock-option plans and some top management salaries are an illegal waste of company assets. Until the suit is settled, Curtis executives cannot exercise their options.

Since Oct. 1, when the dissident group demanded the ouster of Curtis President Matthew J. Culligan, the board has met at least half a dozen times in a vain search for a comprehensive solution to the company's problems. The rebel leaders, Editor in Chief Clay Blair Jr. and Marvin D. Kantor, head of the magazine division, were first suspended, then fired. Both stayed on Curtis' board-and last week both brought suit against Curtis for the unpaid balance of their contracts, which have two more years to run. The suit is directed against Curtis, the First National Bank of Boston and First National's Vice Chairman Serge Semenenko, the man who arranged a $35 million bank loan for Curtis last year.

The directors have yet to find a replacement for President Culligan, who was relieved of his title but was allowed to stay on as chairman of the board. Raymond De Pue McGranahan, the Los Angeles oil company executive who was widely heralded as Culligan's successor, has joined the Curtis board but has declared that he is not a presidential candidate-nor has he yet attended a board meeting.

As for the holes left by Kantor and Blair-and by the four editorial hands who have resigned, among them two assistant managing editors of the Saturday Evening Post-the directors did not fill them at a meeting last week.

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