Gilmour on Track to Top Post at Ford

Allan Gilmour, a bright, soft-spoken Ford executive who has worked hard in recent years to broaden his experience beyond his financial background, appears poised to succeed Ford Chairman Donald Petersen.

Gilmour, 54, currently Ford’s executive vice president for international automotive operations, is expected to be named a vice chairman of the company at next week’s directors meeting, filling a slot left vacant by the recent retirement of William Clay Ford, the younger brother of Henry Ford II.

Gilmour would then be in a position to replace Petersen when he retires in September, 1991. Alternatively, he could first replace Harold “Red” Poling, another vice chairman and Ford’s chief operating officer, when he retires in October, 1990.

Gilmour came up through the ranks of Ford’s finance and corporate staffs and has only recently received operating experience in the automotive sector in an effort to season him on the way to the top.

Like Petersen before him, Gilmour is a quiet, affable and quite articulate man--all traits that Ford craves in its effort to foster a team approach to business.

Gilmour would be only the third non-Ford family member to run the world’s second-largest auto maker. Yet in the next generation, the family may make a comeback. Two young family members, Edsel Ford, Henry Ford II’s son, and Billy Ford, William Clay’s son, are Ford managers--and board members--and have been campaigning hard to reassert the family’s influence inside the auto maker.