To the U. S. man in the street the name Cord means a low-slung automobile, rare and swank, which is entirely too expensive for him to own. To that class which can afford the car, the name means a profane, bespectacled young capitalist whose life has been a garage mechanic's dream. Errett Lobban Cord got his start in Los Angeles building "racing" bodies for junked Fords. He drove in dirt track races in Tacoma. He worked in a garage. In his early 20s he became a flash automobile salesman for the old Moon agency in Chicago. In 1924 he walked into the subdued Auburn company, made it hum, became its president in less than a year. He bought control of Duesenberg, the Lycoming motor works and the Stinson passenger airplane business. By the end of 1933 Cord Corp. controlled not only these plus Auburn but Aviation Corp. (American Airways), Checker Cab Manufacturing Corp. and New York Shipbuilding Corp.
About that time E. L. Cord's fast-moving career suddenly changed direction. In 1934 he took his second wife and their children to England to escape kidnapping threats. In Wall Street rumors began to fly that Capitalist Cord, who kept his fortune in 1929 by a wise abstinence from the markets, had begun to dabble and get burned. Cord stayed in England for two years. Then last summer he attracted the attention of the Securities & Exchange Commission because of his heavy trading in Checker Cab stock. Last April came the astonishing news that hard-bitten Mr. Cord had gone to a Chicago hospital "for a needed rest."
Last week in Chicago E. L. Cord, just turned 43, consented to a Federal court order enjoining him and Checker Cab Mfg. Corp.'s President Morris Markin from the "further violation" of SEC anti-manipulation provisions in their dealings in Cord company securities (an SEC charge which both men, however, denied) and simultaneously announced the sale of his entire holdings in Cord Corp. to a Manhattan banking group for $2,000,000.
Whether or not this was the end of Cord, it was definitely stated by the new owners that it meant the end of that name in the business he had founded. What the new name will be is yet to be determined by the banking houses of Emanuel & Co. and Schroder, Rockefeller & Co. Inc. but placed in charge as the active heir to Cord's kingdom was his hard-boiled lieutenant and friend of many years, Lucius Bass Manning, now president of Aviation Corp., who personally acquired 158,000 of Cord's 500,000 shares of Cord Corp. stock.
Last year Cord Corp., holding working control of Auburn and other Cord subsidiaries, made $306,691 while Auburn turned in another of its whopping losses, $1,522,843. Presumably one of new President Manning's major interests will be trying to sell more Cord, Duesenberg and Auburn automobiles. On the new board of directors formed to assist in this endeavor, one name made news this week: Republic Steel's Chairman Tom Mercer Girdler.