Emerson Electric Co

While driving through an automatic carwash in 1971, George Ballas watched the whirling nylon bristles glide around the contour of his vehicle and wondered if he could adapt the technology to remove the weeds around trees in his yard. At home, he punched holes in a tin can, threaded it with wire and fishing line and bolted it to a rotating lawn edger. He called it the Weed Eater, and when he couldn't sell the concept, he founded his own company and built it into a $40-million-a-year business.

The Navy announced Thursday that it has indefinitely suspended Hazeltine Corp. and two of its former employees from doing business with the federal government, following a Jan. 6 decision by the firm and its former executives to plead guilty to charges that they had defrauded the government. Hazeltine, a Long Island, N.Y., electronics firm, is a subsidiary of Emerson Electric Co., the nation's 43rd-largest defense company. In 1988, Hazeltine had sales of $158 million.

Stuart Symington, former U.S. senator from Missouri, died of heart failure at his home early today, a son said. He was 87. The Democrat served in the Senate from 1953 to 1977, deciding not to seek a fifth term, and held various posts within President Harry S. Truman's administration from 1945 to 1952, including Air Force secretary in 1947-50. He was a favorite-son candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1956 and 1960, losing to Adlai E. Stevenson and John F. Kennedy respectively.

BENEFACTORS OF ESTEEM State of California City of Santa Ana Taco Bell Corp.

Alfred Fleishman, co-founder of one of the world's largest public relations firms, Fleishman-Hillard, and an advocate for the state of Israel and European Jews displaced by World War II, has died after a brief illness. He was 96. Fleishman died Tuesday at his home in the St. Louis suburb of Creve Coeur, Mo. Working with his longtime friend Robert Hillard, Fleishman created the firm in 1946 in a rented room above a Woolworth's store.

Pharmacia Corp. reported sharply lower fourth-quarter profit on rising costs and charges for the planned spin-off of its Monsanto agricultural unit offset strong drug sales. Net income fell 45% to $86 million, or 6 cents a share. The results were slammed by special items totaling 30 cents a share, including the firm's acquisition of Monsanto Co. two years ago, restructuring and a loss of $111 million from the spin-off planned for the fourth quarter of 2002.

The Santa Ana City Council on Monday night approved development guidelines for a 20-year, $600-million project that will bring 400 apartments and 4 million square feet of offices, shops and feeder roads to what is now mostly a celery patch. The development, known as MacArthur Place, is planned for 66 acres northeast of Main Street and MacArthur Boulevard and may include 15 separate buildings of up to 18 stories.

A former Unisys Corp. official, a political consultant and a former Pentagon contracting official pleaded guilty today to federal charges in the defense procurement scandal. Robert Barrett, 55, a former official of Unisys, a major defense contractor, pleaded guilty to bribery and conspiring to conceal the source of campaign contributions to some congressional officials. In a related case, political consultant Joseph Hill, 76, of Mineola, N.Y.

Defense consultant William Parkin, hospitalized 10 days ago after an apparent suicide attempt, pleaded guilty today to charges that he schemed to pass bribes to a Navy engineer who helped two Pentagon contractors win hefty electronics awards. Parkin pleaded guilty to three counts in a federal indictment for which he was scheduled to stand trial next Monday--conspiracy, bribery of a public official and wire fraud. He faces a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison and could be fined $750,000.