In his fight to keep reconversion prices close to 1942 levels, OPA Boss Chester Bowles last week caught a tartar and found a potent ally. The tartar was sandy-haired, aggressive Edward N. Hurley Jr., board chairman of Chicago's Electric Household Utilities Corp. (Thor washers and ironers).
When V-E day came, President Hurley had 6,000 unassembled 1941 washing machines in his plant, leftovers from prewar production. So he assembled the washers, shipped them to his distributors ahead of all other appliance makers. Before shipping them he asked OPA to set a price that...
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