Word: symingtons
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Manhattan's West 52nd Street in 1934, she so impressed the manager that he offered her a paying job. So began a four-year career as a torch singer, which took her into the spotlights of Manhattan's flossiest nightclubs, brought upwards of $1,000 a week. Symington, a lot less famous in those years than his wife, followed her nightclub trail, building up an undeserved reputation as a playboy...
Streak of Respect. In 1938, after two years as president of Baltimore's Rustless Iron & Steel Co., followed by a year of semi-retired dabbling in various ventures, Symington was looking around restlessly for something to do. At the urging of Wall Street Investment Banker David Van Alstyne Jr., he agreed to go to the rescue of St. Louis' ailing Emerson Electric Manufacturing Co. (fans, small motors) in return for $24,000 a year, plus a stock-option deal. Emerson was deep in the red and battered by labor troubles, had barely managed to survive a bitter...
...inner-circle businessmen who gathered at St. Louis' plush Racquet Club grumbled bitterly about Symington's "sellout" to labor, and to this day some of them remain convinced that his romance with U.E.W. was a bit of cynical expediency, however well it may have worked for Emerson Electric. The accusation overlooks Symington's authentic streak of respect for labor, which stems from his grimy days as a chipper and moulder in his uncle's foundry. Over the years, Symington has won the warm respect and esteem of the Electrical Workers' high-voltage President James Carey...
...Load of Coal. After the U.S. got into World War II, Symington set out to make gun turrets for U.S. bombers. During the harried months of the switchover at Emerson, with the Air Corps' General "Hap" Arnold calling him up to plead for "just one turret, just one," Symington worked around the clock. When exhaustion dragged at him, he flopped on a cot in his office. When he woke up, often in the middle of the night, he went back to work. General Arnold got turrets aplenty...
...head of a wartime Senate committee investigating defense production, Missouri's Senator Harry Truman looked closely at Emerson and "could never find anything wrong with it," as he put it. Impressed with Symington and his performance at Emerson, President Truman summoned him to the White House in mid-1945. "Stu," said Truman, "I want to dump a load of coal on you." He asked Symington to serve as head of the Surplus Property Board (later Surplus Property Administration), charged with setting policies for disposing of some $30 billion worth of Government property left over from the war, ranging from...