Motor Casualty

The Automobile Industry, "best managed industry in the U. S.," suffered its first major casualty last week. The $40,000,000 Willys-Overland Co. eased into a "friendly receivership." Chairman John North Willys, who gave up his expensive Ambassadorship to Poland last spring to resume command of his ailing company, and President Linwood Andrews Miller, were appointed receivers.

Small, hustling Motorman Willys was an Overland dealer in Elmira, N. Y. when in the 1907 panic the company he represented neared the brink of bankruptcy. He scurried to Indianapolis, put up $350 (hurriedly raised in a saloon) to help meet the payroll. Reorganizing the company with himself as president, treasurer, general manager and purchasing agent, he made Willys-Overland a leader in its field during the next decade. The Industry regards him as its pioneer in instalment selling. But Willys-Overland was overshadowed by the rise of General Motors and Chrysler in the great motor boom of the 1920's. No dividends were paid on the common stock from 1920 to 1928. In 1929 Motorman Willys rested from his labors, accepted President Hoover's offer of an Ambassadorship as a reward for fat contributions to the G. O. P. He sold his control of Willys-Overland to a Chicago and Toledo group headed by Marshall Field III and Charles Foster Glore. They put some of the stock into their investment trust, Chicago Corp., one of the largest holders with 300,300 shares.

Motorman Willys retained his preferred stock. In 1931 the preferred dividend was omitted. After four omissions control of the company automatically reverted to the preferred holders, of whom Motorman Willys was the largest. So Motorman Willys returned to active management. Having sold his house in Toledo, he commutes from Manhattan where he has a Fifth Avenue home. During his sojourns he stops at the Toledo Club. Frankly paternalistic toward employes, he once hired Barnum & Bailey's circus for two days to amuse them. His doings are always front-page news for Toledo's Press. When King Albert of the Belgians visited Toledo, Mr. Willys provided shining Willys-Knights for the parade. A reporter in an Oldsmobile tried to join the procession, was run to the curb by a policeman before he reached the newsreel photographers.

One of Mr. Willys' first steps was to arrange to make light trucks for International Harvester. For the 1933 market he redesigned his line into low, roomy, sturdy little cars, centered his effort in the less-than-$500 class.

Though not in desperate shape, Willys-Overland has a $2,000,000 bond maturity next September on which it has already defaulted sinking fund payments. During the first nine months of last year it lost nearly $4,000,000. Production lately has been running between 5,000 and 6,000 cars a month. Motorman Willys plans reorganization of the capital structure, was in Manhattan last week seeking fresh funds. P: Unofficial estimates that sales for the first seven weeks of this year were 17% ahead of last heartened the Industry last week. General Motors sales to consumers for January were 50,653 against 19,992 in December, 47,942 in January 1932. Last fortnight Ford dealers finally received their invitations to the annual unveiling of the new Ford--a ceremony delayed even longer than usual this year while Henry Ford was explaining how in the distant future he intends to make bodies out of soy beans and corn stalks.

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