Secrets

There have been three published pictures of Orlando Franklin Weber. One, taken in 1899 when he was a bike racer good enough to be called "The Pride of Milwaukee," showed him crouched over his pedals in a striped jersey. The other two were taken surreptitiously in recent years, after the short-tempered "Pride of Milwaukee" attained front rank among U. S. tycoons.

Mr. Weber's fetish for secrecy enveloped the gigantic firm of which he was the autocrat -- Allied Chemical & Dye Corp.

When the New Deal began poking its scalpel into U. S. industry, Allied finally faced the choice of divulging its financial anatomy or having its 2.400,000 shares delisted from the New York Stock Exchange (TIME, May 8, 1933, et seq.}.

In his Olympian disdain for the public, Orlando Weber was quite willing to be delisted, but opposition grew in the ranks of stockholders and Allied gave in after two years. At the same directors' meeting where the $400,000,000 company gave in completely by agreeing to register on the New York Stock Exchange, Chairman Weber turned over his office to almost equally taciturn Henry Atherton. Since then Allied has revealed what proportion of its income comes from the chemicals it makes, what from investments, has gradually expanded its annual statements. Last week it finally revealed most of the miscellaneous securities the great chemical firm has in the mysterious investment portfolio, which in the happy days of 1929 used to be regarded by speculators as a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

All anyone used to know about Allied's portfolio was its total ($92,000,000 in 1932). Because there were accepted rumors that it was composed of nothing but blue chips. Wall Street was horrified when Orlando Weber was badgered five years ago into admitting that the biggest single holding listed as an asset was really a liability -- $31,000,000 of Allied's own stock.

Allied also disclosed the total of its U. S. Government holdings -- $21,000,000. That left $39,000,000 of miscellaneous investments. Allied long claimed that divulging these holdings would hurt its trade advantages. Last week it looked as though SEC, in persuading Allied to tell all, had promised to keep certain facts secret. Allied's report to SEC, which was made public by the New York Stock Exchange, still left $4,000,000 worth of holdings unexplained.

Biggest surprises revealed last week were Allied's possession of 10.4% of the voting strength of American Light & Traction Co. and big holdings of Libbey-Owens-Ford Glass Co., Owens-Illinois Glass Co., Sloss-Sheffield Steel & Iron Co., Virginia-Carolina Chemical Corp. Allied gave no reason for any of these investments, but others noted that Allied buys much coke from Sloss-Shemeld, once sold much gas to American Light & Traction, was a heavy creditor of Virginia-Carolina Chemical when it went through reorganization, has large sales of chemicals to the two big glass makers.

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