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Curtis "Hank" Barnette, chairman and CEO of Bethlehem Steel Corp., turns 65, the company's mandatory retirement age, on Thursday. The company holds its annual meeting in Delaware on Tuesday.
Thus, the timing was right, Barnette says, for passing the baton to his successor, Duane R. Dunham, this week. "Since our annual meeting is in April, the board decided that it should be the occasion of transition within Bethlehem," Barnette says.
President and COO Dunham, who joined the company as a salesman in 1965, will become chairman and CEO of Bethlehem Steel on Thursday.
Barnette, who joined the company as an attorney in 1967, has been chairman and CEO for the last eight years, many of which were arduous ones for Bethlehem Steel, one of the largest steel producers in the country.
During Barnette's tenure at the helm, the company underwent major restructuring in an effort to improve its financial performance and stockholder value. The restructuring included the sale or shutdown of its unprofitable businesses - Bethship, Bethforge, CENTEC And coal-mining interests - and improvements to its core steel operations at Burns Harbor (Indiana), Sparrows Point (Maryland) and Pennsylvania Steel Technologies (in Steelton). The company also acquired Lukens Inc. of Coatesville to become a premier plate producer in North America.
Barnette regrets the decisions made in the 1970s and 1980s that led to the demise of steel making in Bethlehem in the 1990s. "You always have regrets when decisions are made that affect families and communities adversely."
Still, he says he can live with the decision because it was made in the best interests of the company, its stockholders, employees and retirees, 20,000 of whom live in the Lehigh Valley. "The better question is, 'Was it the right decision for the overall interests of Bethlehem Steel?' and the answer to that is, 'Yes,' " he says.
Last year, the company reported a $183.2 million loss, which it blamed largely on cheap foreign imports. The stock is selling around $5 a share, less than half of its 52-week high.
However, Walter Best, an industry analyst with Merrill Lynch in New York, says Barnette is leaving his successor an improved company.
"I would say Hank has given Duane the company in very good shape in terms of...