Word: statler
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Open for Bids. The battle started three months ago, when word got out that the Statler family, headed by Mrs. Ellsworth Statler, widow of the founder, would listen to bids for the country's third-biggest hotel chain. Zeckendorf promptly offered $50 a share for the 1,551,226 shares of Statler stock outstanding, then selling at $43.50 a share. The Statler board of directors snapped up Zeckendorf's offer, and sent a letter to stockholders advising them to accept. But it turned out that Zeckendorf was talking to the wrong people...
While Zeckendorf was dealing with the Statler directors, Connie Hilton had been quietly making friends with the Statler family itself. When Hilton heard of Zeckendorf's offer, he hopped on a plane, flew from California to New York to talk to "the people who really counted"-Mrs. Statler and other big family stockholders. Hilton's secret weapon: his argument that he could run the Statler chain better than anyone else. Living in Hilton's Waldorf Towers in Manhattan, Mrs. Statler had watched and admired the way Hilton did business, and was inclined to agree...
Last week Hilton sprang his big surprise. By matching Zeckendorf's price, he had won over the Statler family and bought their 753,000 shares (49% of the total) for $37.6 million. Stockholders owning the remaining 798,226 shares got the same offer of $50 a share...
...Manhattan, somewhat dazed by Hilton's speed, Zeckendorf first seemed about to fight, then gracefully surrendered when it turned out that Hilton had already lined up another big block of Statler stock. Wired Bill Zeckendorf: "Sincere and warm congratulations." Into a stockholders' meeting originally scheduled to consider Zeckendorf's offer walked Hilton's lieutenants, with proxies for 1,061,731 shares. Out went most of the Statler's board of directors, including Chairman William L. Marcy, formerly (until his recent divorce) a member of the Statler clan. Three Hiltonians, headed by Connie Hilton as chairman...
Hilton was not saying where he would get the cash to finance his latest coup. But the Manufacturers' Trust Co. promptly lent him $8,000,000 to make a down payment on the 753,000-share Statler-family block, and the word was that insurance firms might lend him another $66 million. The remainder will probably come from debentures and a small Hilton stock issue...