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We haven't given them any contract, and they're not the low bidder. What does this mean?”

I remember saying to him, “I don't know what it means, but you'd better go over and see Knudsen.”

Then he said, “Well, they tell me that Hillman promised it to them. I called the company up myself. I didn't take our people's word for the fact that they were going to get a contract. The Office of Production Management told them they were going to get this order. How is the Office of Production Management going to give them an order? The Navy gives the orders.”

Of course, that was true. Knudsen couldn't sign an order to a firm to produce ships, or steel plates, or hemp rope, or anything else. He could direct the Navy as to how much they ought to order, and so on. He was supposed to see to it that the orders were distributed over firms that had the personnel, had the material, had the management, had the plant to make what they were ordering. This company was some place around San Diego and was producing some small parts that the Navy used in some sort of machinery.

Well, what happened? we covered them, of course. They got the order. I didn't have anything to do with giving them the order. The Assistant Secretary of the Navy came to