The Big Stock Winners of 1972

IN financial myth, the stock market millionaire builds his fortune by a dizzying series of complicated speculations. In reality, the market often reserves its greatest gains for a tiny circle of people who do little if any discernible trading.

During 1972, at least four individuals and three families in the U.S. are known to have made on paper not just millions but tens or hundreds of millions of dollars in stock profits. Alas for the dreams of the average investor, all were rich to begin with, and their formula for multiplying wealth is, to say the least, difficult to follow. It consists of owning, and sitting on, a large block of stock in a major company that the investor or his family founded, and managing that company to eye-popping sales and profit growth. A rundown on the known big winners of 1972:

> David Packard picked exactly the right time financially to resign as Deputy Secretary of Defense in December 1971 and resume the chairmanship of Hewlett-Packard, the California electronics company that he and his Stanford classmate William Hewlett founded in a garage in 1939. During his three years in Washington, Packard had put his H-P stock in a trust, which gave to charity $23 million in dividends and capital appreciation. Last year the 60-year-old Packard got the full benefit of a rise in H-P stock from 48 to 87; the value of his holdings zoomed no less than $260 million, to a total of $581 million. President Hewlett, 59, did even better; his H-P stock rose $271 million, to $604 million. Packard, a highly able administrator, and Hewlett, a shirt-sleeved engineer, managed the company to a 61% profit gain in the last fiscal year; successful introduction of two advanced pocket calculators accounted for much of the increase.

> Anthony Rossi, 72, does not like to talk about his wealth because "you get all kinds of letters from people wanting money." His stock in Tropicana Products, Inc. of Bradenton, Fla., rose $59 million, to $128 million. Rossi, who still speaks in the accents of the Sicily that he left 51 years ago, founded the company in 1946 after a varied career as cab driver, bricklayer, tomato farmer and restaurateur, and he owns 24% of Tropicana's shares. He was one of the first to discover the North's thirst for chilled orange juice shipped from Florida, and has kept the company growing by innovations that have cut the cost of packaging and shipping the juice. In its most recent fiscal year it raised sales 22%, to $105 million, and increased profits by 29%, to $8.8 million.

> Abe Plough, 81, made $39 million on paper last year; his 3% stock ownership in the drugmaking Schering-Plough Corp. rose to a year-end total of $105 million. Plough started in business at the age of 16 by borrowing $125 from his father in order to sell "Plough Antiseptic Healing Oil" door-to-door from a wagon in Memphis; 65 years and 29 acquisitions later, he has built a worldwide company that he still actively manages as chairman. Plough's record of fast earnings growth--from $1.43 a share in 1968 to an estimated $2.90 last year--has caught the eye of investment analysts, who are recommending the stock to mutual funds. Last year buying by these institutions helped push the price from 86 to 137.

> The Uihlein family of Milwaukee saw the value of its 80% holding in Jos. Schlitz Brewing Co. rise about $500 million during 1972, to a year-end total of roughly $1.3 billion. The fortune is divided among some 420 holdings by Uihleins, spouses, children and family trusts, but the biggest block--a bit more than 20% of the company, worth roughly $346 million--is under the control of Chairman and President Robert A. Uihlein Jr., 56, grandson of the nephew of Founder August Krug. Uihlein took over the company in 1961, when its rank in the beer business was slipping. He has revived it by bringing out new brands, building giant, highly efficient breweries that may cut production costs by 45%, and introducing a new fermentation process that speeds up the brewing cycle. Profits rose 31% in the first nine months last year, on an 18% gain in sales.

> The Upjohn family of Kalamazoo, Mich., a close-knit and closemouthed clan, made an estimated $283 million last year, from a rise in its holdings in drug-producing Upjohn Co. to $659 million. Company officials will not confirm these figures; they say only that five family members--who do not constitute the entire family--control about 1.5 million shares. The price of these shares alone increased by $83 million in 1972, to $192 million. The company is headed by three husbands of granddaughters of Founder W.E. Upjohn. They are Chairman Ray T. Par-fet Jr., 50; President Robert M. Boude-man, 55; and Executive Committee Chairman Preston S. Parish, 53. Under them the company last year achieved research breakthroughs on prostaglandins, which are hormone-like substances that may be used to terminate pregnancies. That news prompted excited investors to bid up the stock from 73 to 128.

> The Levy family of Dallas last year saw the paper value of its stock in National Chemsearch Corp., a maker of cleaning chemicals, rise $97 million, to a year-end total of $263 million. The family stock is controlled by three sons of the founder: Chairman Lester Levy, 48; President Irvin Levy, 42; and Executive Committee Chairman Milton P. Levy Jr., 45. The Levys make the Up-johns look like chatterboxes. They will not grant interviews, are little known in Dallas society and rarely mentioned in area newspapers. They are also said to reserve all Chemsearch management decisions for themselves. They have concentrated on producing and marketing a line of specialty chemicals much in demand in industry, and the strategy has worked. In the fiscal year ended last April 30, Chemsearch sales rose 18%, to $82 million, and profits climbed 21%, to $7.9 million.

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