Thanks Plank......you don't mind if I call you Plank, do you?

The material I found dealing with independent directors' not being able to own equity in the company was obviously wrong. I did some research and this is what I came up with.

It appears that Alexander Hamilton, as Secretary of the Treasury, established the rule that no independent director may (forsooth)(his word not mine) own equity in the company. As a result, AAron Burr, who was an independent director in 17 companies, and was making some boss bread, shot him. The history books say Hamilton was bad mouthing Burr......something about his ugly wife, but the real reason has been lost for a couple of centuries....till now.

That rule was in effect until the War of 1812, when the British decided to give it another shot. During that fiasco, the Brits burned down the White House. Rumor has it that it was raining that night and they had no dry kindling to start it. Some enterprising corporal, who had collected a number of sheets of paper in the Congress, expecting to put them to good use at the conclusion of a necessary bodily function, was talked into giving them up. Would you believe it? In that group of papers was the very law concerning independent directors. The Law was never popular and so, in redrafting the papers that were destroyed, the part about the independent thing was overlooked. Nobody objected and Hamilton was dead so that leaves us with at least one ID who wants to make more than just his fee.

Who said history is dull?