Ash

"A word here about the company's farsighted arrangement, unique at the time, to gain maximum benefit from stock options as a lure for the best talent without diluting the stock of the shareholders. It came about partly by accident. In the agreement with Lehman Brothers, Tex had ear- marked a part of his personal stock to be used for the express purpose of inducements ( Tex held the largest and controlling share of stock, followed in order by Ash and Jamieson ap- proximately on a 2-1-1 basis ) . Thus Tex would be in a posi- tion to face any future criticism of stock options by share- holders (which has occurred as recently as 1966) by the unanswerable rebuttal that the shares involved were coming out of his own hide. And further, that since he was disposing of his own property in the best interests of the company, the details and terms of each transaction were nobody else's business. The advantages of such flexibility, he could also point out, in baiting the right hook for the right fish, were obvious when compared with the inflexibility of the custom- ary stock option plans which must meet the approval of shareholders."