Changes of the Week

P: Samuel Maurice McAshan Jr., 54, moved up from vice president to president of the world's biggest cotton dealer, Anderson, Clayton & Co. of Houston, replacing Harmon Whittington, who retired under pressure at 59. McAshan, an Anderson, Clayton regular since he left Princeton ('27), is described by Founder Will Clayton, his father-in-law, as having "the quickest mind and greatest curiosity of anyone I've encountered." The shift marks a return to power of courtly, fiercely competitive Will Clayton, 79, onetime U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, who retired as chairman of Anderson, Clayton in 1950--only to see sales start to move down. They skidded from $1,068,000,000 in 1951 to $792 million in fiscal 1958. Clayton, still the biggest stockholder (he and his family own 40% worth $52 million), tangled with President Whittington and Chairman and Chief Executive Lamar Fleming Jr. over ways to start the curve up again, last month stepped out of retirement and put himself back on the board.

P: Albert Handschumacher, 40, became president of Lear, Inc. (TIME, May 4), replacing James Anast, 40, former aide to Federal Aviation Boss Pete Quesada. Anast was made president last April, soon showed he planned to be the boss. He politely notified Founder William Lear, 57, who controls the company, not to visit the plant without forewarning Anast (replied Lear: "I'm going to make believe, young man, that I did not hear that"). Showing who is boss, Bill Lear, without warning, turned to Director Handschumacher at the quarterly board meeting, asked if he would take over. Says Lear of Handschumacher, a former Lear vice president, who left in 1957 to become a veep of Rheem Manufacturing Co.: "I told him not to get too far away, that we had plans for him."

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