response. In the summer of 1969, the Sea-Land division of R.J. Reynolds Industries made its plans for the SL-7 public, ordering eight vessels from European shipyards. The price tag was $32 million per ship. Containers and other equipment would bring the total cost of the SL-7s to $435 million. For McLean Industries, even if it could have raised the money, spending nearly half a billion dollars on ships would have been a bet-the-company gamble. For R. J. Reynolds, it was almost spare change. The tobacco giant was so cash rich that in 1970 it purchased a petroleum company, American Independent
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