In Boston last week, silver-haired, short-tempered Patrick Benedict McGinnis, 58, bowed out as head of a Class I U.S. railroad for the fourth time in ten years. But in surrendering his job as chief executive of the 127-year-old Boston & Maine, the hotspur of U.S. railroading at least set a refreshing precedent. On previous occasions—aboard the Norfolk Southern, the Central of Georgia and the New Haven—McGinnis was tossed out by angry stockholders. At the B. & M. he decided to move up to chairman on his own hook.
Ostensibly for health...