Word: chock
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Chock full o' commotion
Black's message was aimed at fending off dissident shareholders trying to take control of the company he founded in the 1920s, then nursed into a group of nut stores that became Chock Full O' Nuts Corp. The company evolved into a chain of counter-service restaurants, mostly in New York City. But the biggest chunk of its fiscal 1982 sales of $116 million came from its "heavenly coffee," sold nationally under Chock Full's label and promoted in saccharine TV commercials by Black's third wife, Page, who looks fiftyish...
Dissidents among Chock Full's 20,000 shareholders are led by Jerry Finkelstein, 66. He runs Struthers Wells Corp., a maker of power-plant equipment, and publishes the New York Law Journal. The dissidents claimed that Black had not set foot in his office for a year and had admitted he kept in touch with Chock Full through his wife. They said he had not attended a directors' meeting since August 1981, and knew the names of only four of his fellow directors. They charged also that Chock Full's president, Leon Pordy, Black's cardiologist...
Black and Pordy struck back. "I am not an absentee manager," said Pordy. "I spend 40 to 50 hours a week here." They countered in a splashy New York Times ad that Finkelstein's businesses lost money or had minimal earnings, whereas Chock Full's earnings stood at $5.4 million. Cracked Black: "Finkelstein has not done as well with his companies from his office as I have done from home and hospital." Diagnosed Pordy: "A doctor would be good for his sick company...
Ronald Reagan could not have picked a better audience (4,200 members of the National Catholic Educational Association), or a more fitting date (April 15, the deadline for filing tax returns). His speech was chock-full of applause lines, and he hit nearly every one on cue. "I believe that working Americans are overtaxed and underappreciated." Cheers and applause. "I have come to Chicago to propose another tax bill that will allow them to keep a little more of their own money. I have come to propose a tuition tax credit for parents . . ." At this point, his listeners rose...