Preston Tucker and His Battle to Build the Car of Tomorrow by Steve Lehto

Author:Steve Lehto
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chicago Review Press
Published: 2016-09-17T04:00:00+00:00

* * *

Even with all his legal problems, Preston Tucker still believed that if he raised a few million dollars he could reopen his plant and resume manufacturing cars. It was a long shot. Rumors abounded of “angel” investors, even after Howard Hughes had publicly stated his lack of interest in the project. On January 3, 1949, an attorney appeared before Judge Igoe and said he represented an “unnamed interest” that was “willing and ready” to help put the Tucker Corporation “back on its feet.”9 The attorney would not publicly identify the interest but offered to tell the judge in chambers. The judge considered the possibility and temporarily stayed the legal proceedings.

Automotive insiders thought the most likely suspect was the Willys-Overland Motor Company, whose president had visited the plant recently.10 Nothing came of this overture, but more than one company may have been considering a partnership with Tucker. The Checker Cab Manufacturing Company had also done some serious investigation into the possibility. Checker sent an engineer on January 4 to examine the factory, and Preston Tucker had lunch with Checker’s president a little over a week later. The deal fell through but was of enough substance to be reported by the New York Times.11

To give Tucker time to locate new funding sources, in early 1949 Tucker’s attorneys asked the court for permission to reorganize the company with their client still at the helm while litigating the claims against it. Tucker’s attorneys told the court that the company had assets of $14,434,380 against liabilities of $1,643,175.12 These figures must have surprised some people, with so many people claiming that the Tucker Corporation was financially ruined. Preston Tucker explained the rationale behind the numbers. The Tucker Corporation owned Aircooled Motors, the company in Syracuse it had bought to provide the ’48’s engine. The purchase price had been $1.8 million, and the company produced a steady profit of $400,000 annually. Tucker believed Aircooled was actually worth closer to $5 million.13

The court granted the request and appointed trustees to oversee the reorganization. They wouldn’t have to make their first report until May 2. All the civil actions were put on hold. Tucker had bought himself a reprieve, but the new arrangement caused other complications. The SEC had not yet returned the corporation’s financial records, and now with court-appointed overseers in place, the agency turned the documents over to trustees rather than giving them back to Tucker. Tucker would never be given access to them again.14

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.