We Met Such Interesting
People in 1863 We strongly disapproved
of some; others inspired us; we cried with some and laughed with
others but they
MADAME NHU
"If there were an attack on the
palace, the last one to go down shoot
ing would be Madame Ngo Dinh
Nhu, and when she did both guns
would be blazing." A British diplo
mat said that shortly before the
South Vietnam army did attack the
presidential palace in Saigon and
kill Madame Nhu's brother-in-law
(the president) and her husband
(reportedly the power behind the
throne). Madame Nhu, however,
was in a Hollywood hotel at the
time, resting from a world-spanning
monologue during which she shocked
many by referring to Buddhist im
molation as "barbecuing" and by
calling American officers in Vietnam
"little soldiers of fortune." Was she
the "Dragon Lady" or Joan of Arc?
Or just a woman who talked too
much? In the waning weeks of '63,
she was just a widow, but experts
predict she will emerge from
mourning "with guns blazing."
YOGI BERKA
Interesting people are net al
ways the winners. The New York
Yankees perennially win, yet drew
only 100,000 more fans in '63 than
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never, never bored us
the hapless New York Nets. Only
one "character" entertained the
payees: Yogi Bern, he of prehis
toric physique and ridiculous rhet
oric ("Nobody goes to that restau
rant any more. If s too crowded.")
Maybe that's why the Yankees
pushed dour Ralph Houk upstairs,
uuned colorful Yogi as manager
of the gray-pinstriped Yankees.
Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle
wired their pal: "We would like
our unconditional release to be-
professional golfers."
LIZ TAYLOR AND
RICHARD BURTON
"Where's my husband?" cried
Elizabeth Taylor in a melee at Mont
real airport. Actually, Eddie Fisher
was 1,000 miles away in Nevada
(often with actress Renata Boeck).
What Liz meant was where is trav
eling companion Richard Burton,
whom she was accompanying to
Mexico to make a movie. The confu
sion was international and year
long. Twice headlines announced the
couple would seek divorces from
their legal spouses : twice they huffily
denied it In Mexico, would Burton
further confuse matters by discov
ering the charms of costar Sue
("Lolita") Lyon? Apparently his
mind was elsewhere. "The other
night," he told a reporter, "I totaled
21 (glasses of tequila) before I
stopped counting. It was at the
beach, and Elizabeth and the others
were covered with bites the next
morning. I had none. I think I have
discovered something."
ROGER STAUBACH
They call Navy's star quarter
back "Jolly Roger" Staubach, but
"jolly" doesn't describe his per
sonality. He is a serious, modest
Middie until Saturday afternoons,
when he becomes a daring, danc
ing pass master. Roger wanted to
be a priest; then be wanted to go
to Notre Dame. The Navy was vir
tually third choice, and its curric
ulum is so tough for him that he
has no time for "jolly" undergrad
uate high jinks. Besides, the junior
classman gets up long before the
early-rising Navy so he can at
tend 6 La. Mass. Says Roger:
"There's lots to be thankful for."
The Navy says, "Amen."
GEN. CHARLES DeGAULLE
To most of the Western world he
is a cartoonist's delight who goes
around upsetting applecarts. To
most Frenchmen he is Le Grand '
Charles, the soldier who took power
in 1958 when the country, a "me
too" nation in the shadow of the
United States and Britain, was
verging on civil war. Gen. Charles
I Jl
By THE EDITORS
DeGauUe changed all that and
never more noticeably than in these
past months. He barred Britain
from the Common Market; he dog
gedly went ahead with atomic test
ing; he scotched plans for a NATO
nuclear force. Closer to borne, he
played South Vietnam against the
United States and set out to take
over our leadership in European
military defense. Why? Some say
he is a man who holds a grudge.
During World War II, the U.S.
initially refused to recognize his
Free French government; he felt
personally insulted by both Church
ill and Roosevelt. There may be
some smaHness in this great, tower
ing man, but those who believe in
him say bis motivations are solely
those of a patriot. Only one person,
however, has absolutely no doubts
about what DeGauUe is up to
that is DeGauUe himself. "Nobody
else can become the master of our
destiny," he says. "We are the best
judges of what we ought to do."
Da MARIA MAYER
"The Beauty in Gottingen" was
how they referred to her during
undergraduate days at that Ger
man university. Nowadays she is
Dr. Maria Goeppert Mayer, and
when she attends faculty parties
at the University of California at
La Jolla, observers note that "men
still collect around her." What
makes her an especially interest
ing woman, however, is that she
won this year's Nobel Prize in
physics (with J. Hans D. Jensen of
the University of Heidelberg for
their joint study on the construc
tion of the atomic nucleus). A 57-year-old
mother of two, she is the
first woman to win the physics
prize since Madame Curie in 1903.
Her comment when told the King
of Sweden would award her the
prize, worth about $12,000: "Good.
I've always wanted to meet a king."
N6 1 ' -
MR. AND MRS. ANDREW
FISCHER
Dr. James N. Berbos kept picking,
up several fetal heartbeats in his
patient, Mrs. Andrew Fischer of
Aberdeen S. D. "I suspected that
she might have triplets," he recalls.
So he ordered X-rays and discovered
that he was treating a 54,000,000-to-1
patient. Mrs. Fischer was carry
ing quintuplets. Three days later,
on Sept. 14, Dr. Berbos delivered
four girls and a son to Mrs. Fischer,
already the mother of five, within
72 minutes. "Nerve-wracking," said
the doctor. Mr. Fischer, a shipping
clerk, and his wife seemed to agree
but mostly because of the dizzy
ing surge of well-wishers, from
President Kennedy to promoters
wanting the quints to sell their
products. Before the family could
even name the fivesome, they had a
popular label They were "The Million-Dollar
Babies," a conservative
estimate on how much they will
make as America's new darlings.
ANDRIAN AND VALENTIN A
The bride wore white: ankle
length gown, double veil, gloves,
roses. The groom was so calm he
helped his tearful bride slip a
plain gold band on his finger. The
couple: Soviet cosmonette Valen
tina Tereshkova, 26, and cosmo
naut Andrian Nikolayev, 34. Val
entin had previously dodged
reporters' questions about her ru
mored romance by saying, "Every
woman hopes to marry someday."
When that day came, it was a spec
tacular one covered by Moscow
television. Acting as big daddy
(fathers of the couple were killed
in the war) was Nikita Khrush
chev, who proposed 20 or 21 toasts
(reporters lost count but noted that
Nikita only sips these days) and
quipped: "May the marriage be a
long one. May yon have radar to
avoid all the obstacles of life."
SANDY KOUFAX
Interesting people are beset peo
ple. Sandy Koufax, lefty star of the
Los Angeles Dodgers, wanted to be
a basketball player; baseball scouts
grabbed him because he could throw
so hard (without any idea where
the ball would go). When Sandy
mastered control pitching, he in
curred a finger injury, and doctors
feared they might have to amputate.
But in 1963 Sandy came back with
strike-out records and a no-hit
game. In September, the Dodgers
St. Louis series was the pennant
deciding one but, alas, Sandy's
turn on the mound fell on the Jew
ish New Year. Solomonlike manager
Walt Alston pitched Sandy out of
turn, and the fireballer sent the
Dodgers toward a World Series
sweep over the Yankees with a stun
ning shutout Headlined a Los An
geles newspaper: "HAPPY NEW
YEAR, SANDY!" At last it was.
SIR ALEC DOUGLAS-HOME
He started the year as Lord
Home, British foreign secretary,
and ended it as Sir Alec Douglas
Home, prime minister, having giv
en up his noble title for a seat in
the House of Commons. By any
name, he seemed a tepid cup of
English tea to Americans, who
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wondered mostly why he pro
nounced his name "Hume." The'
story goes that a battling Scottish
ancestor (the Home family dates
back to the 13th century) tried to
rally his warriors with the cry,
"For Home! For Home!" The fol
lowers misunderstood and ran
home. Since then the Homes have
preferred mispronunciation to dis
honor. Beneath Sir Alec's bland
exterior, however, courses- that
same fighting blood. Reluctant to
take the job at first, Sir Alec, once
committed, survived a bitter polit
ical struggle against far more am
bitious leaders. When word of his
victory leaked out from party head
quarters, London crowds shouted:
"It's Home! It's Home!" this time
nobody misunderstood.
JESSICA MITFORD
Jessica Mitford comes from a no
ble English family noted for getting
people's hackles up. Her father, for
instance, stirred British tempers by
sympathizing with Hitler. Jessica's
contribution to family tradition is
this year's best-selling book, "The
American Way of Death," which
studies alleged overcommercializa
tion in the undertaking industry.
(The cost of living, she says, rose
71 percent since World War II
while the cost of dying rose 100
percent.) Clergymen largely praised
the book for exposing "pagan cus
toms and trappings," but under
takers mourned that Miss Mitford
had castigated them with inaccurate
statistics and unfair interpreta
tions. Congressman James B. Utt
(R.-Calif.) went further. He ac
cused Miss Mitford of "Communist
front activities" and striking "an
other blow at Christian religion."
Her reply: "Red herring."
LUDWIG ERHARD
"Onkle Ludi" looks like a Dutch
uncle 220 pounds of rosy-cheeked
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Wbdcly j December 29, 196S
Gemiltlichkeit who smokes Brazilian
cigars, works with Beethoven music
in the background, and drinks cham
pagne and beer. But West Germans
wondered if an uncle figure like
Ludwig Erhard, a fervent anti-Nazi
handpicked by American occupation
forces to revive his nation's econo-
my, would make a firm chancellor.
One who doubted it was Konrad
Adenauer, who at 88 was reluctantly
turning over the post to Erhard. "A
rubbery lion," Der Alte used to call
hint and Ludi took the abuse good
naturedly. Would this "rubbery
lion" bend to the ambitions of
Charles DeGauUe who wants to in
crease France's influence in western
Europe at the expense of the U. S.?
Erhard lost no time in knocking the
"national egotism" typified by Le
Grand Charles. It reminded NATO
leaders of a previous observation by
Herr Erhard: "I am an American
invention."
POPE PAUL VI
Giovanni Cardinal Montini chose
the name Paul when he succeeded
the Ute Pope John XXIH as su
preme pontiff of the Roman Catho
lic Church. It was a significant
choice. The question had been
whether the new pope would carry
on John's dream of aperturismo
an "opening" of the church to new
ideas of the modern world. The
name Paul hutted of the new pope's
direction it was St. Paul who rec
ognized the universality of the
teachings of Jesus and carried
Christianity beyond the confines
of a Palestinian sect. John had
dreamed that the Christianity
spread by Paul could once more
find a type of unity, and Pope Paul
VI lost no time in assuring the
world that he succeeded to this
ideal as well as to the Chair of
Peter. He said: "I long to make
mine the wish that spontaneously
and generously welled up in the
hearts of my predecessors, espe
cially John XXIII: come, let the
barriers that separate us fall!"
(Continued on page 6)
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