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Former Shipyard Executive, Frederick P. Palen Dies The sudden death in New York, Dec. 2, of Frederick P. Palen, form- erly vice president of the Newport New Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., and associated with that company for 35 years until his resignation in January, 1930, came as shock to his many friends in shipbuilding and shipping circles. He died of pneu- monia at Rockefeller Reearch hospi- tal after an illness of three days. He was 61 years old. Funeral services were held Dee. 4 at the Church of the Heavenly Rest, Fifth avenue and Ninetieth street. Burial was at Rich- mond, Va. At the time of his death Mr. Palen was president of the Marine Journal, New York. His association with the Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. goes back to within a few years of that company’s organization, in 1887. During his service with this com- pany he became prominent not only in its affairs but in many of the con- structive efforts of the shipbuilding industry as a whole. Resignation as Vice President His resignation as vice president of the Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., a position he had held for 14 years, came about a few months after the senate investigation in 1929 of the activities of W. B. Shearer at the Geneva Arms confer- ence in 1927. At the investigation, Mr. Palen frankly assumed respon- sibility for having employed Mr. Shearer to represent three of the leading shipbuilding companies at the arms conference as observer. Mr. Palen explained to the committee that he had been impressed by Mr. Shearer’s knowledge of naval and merchant marine affairs and had sug- gested he be sent to Geneva as an observer, for his own company, the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp., and the New York Shipbuilding Co. in order to keep these companies auth- oritatively informed of the trends of the conference. He emphatically de- nied that his instructions to Mr. Shearer went beyond. the entirely legitimate purpose of observation to keep the shipyards informed at first hand of the progress of the confer- ence. Later Mr. Palen became associated with the United States Lines in the preparation of plans and_ specifica-: tions for a large shipbuilding pro- gram including two superliners. The project was finally dropped due to the business depression. He then became president of the Primrose Publishing Corp., New York, publisher of the Marine Journal. Mr. Palen worked effectively in ad- vancing the position of the American merchant marine, and was a strong supporter of the legislation which finally resulted in the merchant ma- rine act of 1928, allowing mail pay for essential American shipping serv- ices. He was credited with a number of engineering inventions in connec- tion with modern shipbuilding. While he believed in government protection and aid to American shipping to off- set the recognized differentials in cost _of construction and operation as com- pared with foreign lines, he did not believe in government operation or construction of vessels and felt that private initiative must be depended upon to develop the country’s mer- chant marine and as a safeguard for the nation in time of war. Born in Jenningsville, Pa., April 20, 1872, a direct descendent of Gylbert Palen who came to America from Holland in 1680, Mr. Palen was grad- uated from Cornell university in me- chanical engineering in 1894. He then began his career at the Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. as a draftsman, rising in five years to become chief draftsman in charge of 150 men and shortly afterward assis- tant plant engineer under C. F. Bailey. In 1912 he was made assis- tant general manager of the shipyard and three years later vice president, with offices in New York in charge of the financial and contracting de- partments. He was an organizer as well as an engineer and was one of the charter members and long one of the execu- tive officers of the old Atlantic Coast Shipbuilding association, Philadel- phia. Later he was instrumental in the formation of the National Council of American Shipbuilders, New York, and continued as an executive of this association. On his retirement from the Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., (Continued on Page 29) MARINE REvVIEw—January, 1934 New York Propeller Club Holds Dinner Meeting An important meeting of the Pro- peller club of New York, with an ex- ceptionally large attendance, was held on the evening of Dec. 14 at the down- town Athletic club, New York City. The meeting was addressed by Wil- liam H. Davis, deputy administrator of the N.R.A. in charge of the prepa- ration of codes for the shipping in- dustry. Mr. Davis took the occasion to point out to steamship companies that unless they could arrive at a satisfactory agreement on a code for the shipping industry by Jan. 1, he would be compelled to make his own recommendations for a code of fair practice. Several hundred representatives of shipping companies attended the din- ner meeting. As a solution of the problem facing the international lines in reaching an agreement on a code, he suggested fixing a minimum rate on particular kinds of cargoes and allowing the lines freedom to com- pete as they might see fit at rates above the minimum. As far as the intercoastal companies are concerned he promised to make recommendations of his own for gov- erning this trade under the N.R.A. unless they could agree among them- selves on a code before the first of the year. For handling questions of labor, Mr. Davis made the suggestion that two public relation boards be set up, one to deal with longshore labor and the other with seamen labor. In regard to longshore labor he also made the additional suggestion that all long- shoremen be registered, and that em- ployment of longshoremen by steam- ship companies be done only through common agents. C. H. C. Pearsall, vice president of the Colombian Steamship Co., and president of the Port of New York Propeller club, president. District Passenger Agent The General Steamship Corp. Ltd. has appointed Herbert P. Wynn, dis- trict passenger agent at Los Angeles, succeeding T. E. Angelius, who has been made assistant general passenger agent for the French Line at San Francisco. Mr. Wynn’s shipping career began in 1922, when he was engaged by the Dollar Line in Shanghai. After five years in Shanghai, he spent another year in the San Francisco office of the Dollar line. In 1928 Mr. Wynn entered the or- ganization of the International Travel Bureau, and severed his connection with that organization in 1931 to join the passenger department of the General Steamship Corp. at Los An- geles. 21