Unpopular Science

Jacob Fastbinder in was a great success, but not the success his father had envisioned. It didn’t matter. His father’s time was over, even if it did take the old man a long four years, three months and six days to finally die.

The advent of cheap computerized controls made the famous nested relay switch system obsolete not long after the elder Fastbinder died and Jacob Fastbinder III became executive director of the company. Without a hugely profitable invention to shine his star, he was judged solely on his management skills, which were less impressive. Before long he was ousted from the director’s chair.

Only the family link to the company, and the need to save corporate face, motivated the board of directors to give Jacob Fastbinder in control of a new start-up firm in the United States. A grand new opportunity, the press releases promised, but Fastbinder knew he was being set up. A large-scale failure in the United States, and the board would have the public justification it needed to eject the last descendant of the company founder.

All went as planned. Fastbinder American Controls Corp. generated big losses. Fastbinder was ousted, but the board agreed to allow him to receive, as severance, a share on sales from his personal patents, which were licensed to the U.S. division. This was an easy concession for the board to make, as there were, in fact, no profits at all coming from the U.S. division.

Fastbinder III sold his shares in the parent firm and kept only his German homes. Still a wealthy man, Jacob went into seclusion on his desert estate in New Mexico, near Tucumcari, and held a press conference that appeared entirely superfluous and self-aggrandizing before the fact. None of the big media outlets sent reporters to listen to a bitter ex-CEO spout vitriol about the company that fired him.

The only tidbit of interest came when Fastbinder explained he “…removed himself from the company in an effort to escape the long history of associations between his company and its sympathy for the Nazi cause during the war.”

In truth, there was no longer any public perception of a link between Fastbinder Machine Werks and the Nazis—until the press conference rekindled it Fastbinder’s bad PR sent Fastbinder Machine Werks into financial stutters. His timing helped—-the world was finally getting around to taking legal action against firms known to have helped the Nazi cause.

He received calls from various legal organizations asking if the family ever possessed artworks and treasures looted by the Nazis. “Oh, the family never owned such valuables. The corporation, however… I seem to recall a few interesting paintings and boxes of jewels in a basement vault.”

Fastbinder allowed his U.S. and German properties to be searched, and they came up clean except for a lot of antique machine parts of no value.

Fastbinder Machine Werks came up clean, as well.

“Tell those nincompoops to look in zee basement vault!” Fastbinder said to the head of the UN agency charged with the investigation.

“Well, the thing is, Mr. Fastbinder, we can’t find the basement vault, and nobody on the board seems to know where one is.”

“They told you this?” Fastbinder asked incredulously. Had he forgotten to tell the board about his father’s secret vault in the headquarters subbasement? Oh, shiest, now the company was going to look like it was trying to cover up. Too bad for the company.

“I know it exists. Zee executive director of zee board of directors described it to me personally,” Fastbinder said. “He never saw fit to allow me to view it myself, however.” Fastbinder told the UN exactly where in the basement they might search for fresh wall repairs.

The vault was found. MORE THAN THREE STOLEN PAINTINGS FOUND IN FASTBINDER WERKS VAULT! thundered the headlines in the London newspaper. Fastbinder had a copy overnighted to New Mexico. The German papers were too uptight to do the story justice. FASTBINDER VAULT REVEALS ONLY FOUR PAINTINGS. Hmm, Fastbinder thought, maybe he should have left more of the family art.

A week later, the London media exclaimed. EACH OF THE THREE-DOZEN FASTBINDER MASTERPIECES IDENTIFIED AS ART LOOTED FROM JEWS BY NAZIS!Even Fastbinder had to smirk when he read it. The “masterpieces” in question had, in actuality, been the least valuable works of art in the entire lot—which Fastbinder had liquidated for more than thirty million euro after his father finally kicked the bucket.

In the end, Fastbinder Machine Werks settled with the former owners of the paintings. The sum was nine times their value—Fastbinder knew this since he had the paintings expertly appraised before deciding to sacrifice them to the cause.