Leo the Lion

The job of Alien Property Custodian is a job for a lion. In World War I, the administration of some $500,000,000 worth of foreign holdings in the U.S. became a muddled mess, spoiled several reputations, took 24 years and many courts to clean up. In World War II, more than ten times as much enemy property in the U.S. is involved ($7,000,000,000). Last week the vast job fell to dignified Leo Thomas Crowley.

Eight years ago, pink-faced, silver-haired Leo Crowley was called to Washington as a symbol of banking integrity, to restore public confidence in banking. A small town Wisconsin boy, a onetime grocery clerk, Mr. Crowley was eminent in Wisconsin church and business circles. Pope Pius XI decorated him with the Order of St. Gregory for his services. He was president of the Bank of Wisconsin, sponsored legislation to strengthen the State's banking system. Mr. Roosevelt made him chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

In 1939 Standard Gas & Electric, wanting the services of such a symbol of integrity, invited leonine Mr. Crowley to be chairman of its board. With apparent White House approval, Leo the Lion took the job. His salary as chairman of FDIC is nothing. His salary from S. G. & E.: $50,000 a year. With Mr. Roosevelt's evident permission, he has assumed half a dozen directorates of other private companies.

Hard-working Mr. Crowley has few diversions. Once he owned a race horse. Occasionally he visits a race track. But the sporting world is not his background. The proper background for Leo Thomas Crowley is marble & mahogany. A bachelor, he lives in Washington's glittering Mayflower Hotel. In his FDIC office hangs a "No Smoking" sign. He cannot stand the smell, which annoys his sinuses.

Last week, at the age of 52,* Leo the Lion accepted his latest and biggest job without a tremor.

*Blurted 50-year-old Treasury Secretary Morgenthau, who proclaimed a month ago that he was going to get the job: "I like to see young fellows come up. Mr. Crowley is young and ambitious."

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