MERGERS: Three Up, Three Down

For months, four big U.S. airlines have been waiting for the formalities that would merge them into two bigger systems—Colonial with National, Capital with Northwest. Last week, to the surprise of the lines and CAB, which had urged the mergers, the deals were off. Colonial and Northwest stockholders had turned them down.

At the news, Eastern Air Lines' President Edward V. Rickenbacker, who had already made a rival offer to Colonial before the National deal, took heart. He announced that he would make a second try, since a group of Colonial stockholders had bucked the National merger on the grounds that Eastern's offer was better, because it would place a higher valuation on Colonial stock.

Last week, the proposed merger of New York's Manufacturers Trust Co. with the New York Trust Co. (TIME, May 26), was also called off because "certain large stockholders" of New York Trust refused to okay the deal.