THAT WONDERFUL A & P!

As processed as anything you can find shelved between Jane Parker and Ann Page, this corporate history (part family; part profit and loss statement) of the Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company which is just coming around the bend of its centennial. George Huntington Hartford went to work for a George Gilman in the late 1860's as a clerk, ended up as a partner (not on paper) and launched the thousands of stores which spread across the country. Successor John Hartford inaugurated many necessary changes (specials--loss leaders) but the only remaining scion, namesake GHH has been totally divorced from the origins of his millions and has been the playboy-aesthete of art, motion pictures, the theatre, Show magazine and other disastrous enterprises including marriage. . . . It's hard to say what redemption center Mr. Hoyt has in mind but give him a few plaid stamps for effort.