Part VII
4 In the unpremeditated evolution which goes right on willynillying the outs for mankind this first armistice period was, however, quite validly themed ‘‘quantitative,’’ for it displayed no lack of proclivity for ever increasing mechanical efficiency; though the proclivity was patently prejudiced.
5 Efficiency of immediate money making at source or in processing, was the petty fixation,—and though petty nevertheless responsible for man’s acquisition of literally big things—giant presses, mammoth shovels, titanic mills, transcontinental pipe lines galore.
6 And though uncomprehending its fated fulfillment of any important function in the vast over-all historic design this twelve year span
7 proved to be the period of major development of plant and structure
8 for an ultimately to be successful industrial economy.
9 The period specialized on ‘‘producers’ goods,’’ inherently of large tonnage,—over one hundred and twenty-nine billion slowly revolving debt-dollars worth (representing 74% of the total public and private pawn ticket) which caused all the managers to feel unduly important and falsely secure, because the bankers who sponsored them had inferred that the money was theirs.
10 It swole the heads even of engineers, who in the second armistice period, ‘32-‘37, together with lawyer vice-presidents were fast being substituted for the Kentucky colonels as executive heads of industry.
11 Thus were the new managers found easy prey by the Publicitors who effectively ‘‘suggested’’ that the managers keep their fine technical eyes fixed on the vast internal corporate mechanics leaving the ‘‘treacherous’’ external relations to P. R.
12 Thus did P. R. misassume
13 that at last it had a clear stage on which unmolestedly to do its act
14 and a seemingly perpetual stooge deluxe,—the government interference boogey man,—‘‘that treacherous guy in the White House.’’ Oh-oh.
15 But with the plant completed
16 the period 1932--1937
17 witnessed the unforeseen shift from a ‘‘heavy’’ to a ‘‘consumer’s’’ goods domination of industry, which shift, though a most evident raison d’etre of industrialization, was of sufficient popular surprise to elicit the phrase
18 ‘‘forgotten man.’’
19 And that man
20 was distinctly a horror to P. R.
21 who tried to nose him
22 back into oblivion
23 with streams of red paint.
24 But the Publicitor’s cheap brand of lacquer only stuck to some cooties and fleas whose inferiority complex was thrilled at their sudden dramatic visibility.
25 So from 1933 to 1937
26 with marked efficiency in ‘‘consumer’’ productions characterized by ever increasing output of ever increasing quality in ever shorter periods of time, the industrial gains were literally instrumented
27 by instruments of control rather than by adding new heavy equipment.
28 —Those damned engineers!—
29 And here was another unexpected event to P. R. and the heavy-economists.
30 Of these miniscule instruments which hundred-folded the output of giant machinery, the photo-electric cell is most typical.
31 And so in this period
32 because affairs were going so hay-wire research was grudgingly returned to its 1917 assignment at industrial stroke-oar.
33 Then why the bust of 1938 if this assignment spelled an ‘‘ultimate’’ of Industrialization?