Word: wpb
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1942-1942
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...upped genial, broad-shouldered, tall William Loren Batt, 57, from chairman of the requirements committee to be vice chairman of WPB. chief of staff to determine policies, direct operations. Batt rose from a Wabash farm and an Indiana roundhouse to head the big S.K.F. Industries (ball bearings), went into NDAC...
Unwilling as ever to hurt anybody by firing him, he packed Phil Reed, chief of the bureau of industry branches, off to London, as he had transferred Walter Wheeler, former chief of WPB subcontracting, to the Boston regional office...
...another vice chairman and his deputy on the combined production and resources board, Nelson picked slim, ruddy-faced, grey-haired James S. Knowlson, former director of WPB's industry operations, an oldtime friend from Chicago. President of Stewart-Warner Corp., Knowlson became Nelson's deputy director of priorities in September 1941. On his first day he told staff members: "If there's any guy who doesn't think we can deliver this program in 1942, he had better get his time check, turn in his tools and get the hell out of here, quick...
Work to be Done. Donald Nelson hoped his realignment would stick. Some problems were left on the stove to simmer. One is a serious transportation jam, but he could do little with it. For Transportation Chief Joe Eastman has no status on WPB, must work round about. Another is Harold Ickes' separate jurisdiction over petroleum. Authority over electric power rests with six different Federal agencies. Plant expansion has to be checked again, lest there be more factories than materials to feed them...
Hundred-Tonners. A WPB air-cargo committee has explored the possible construction of 100-ton winged trucks. The Department of Commerce wants 800 all-steel freighters (stainless steel is still at a premium). The Army has contracted for lots of DC-3s, hundreds of 25-ton Curtiss twin-engined troop-toting Commandos...