Discoveries & Disclosures

In Washington, Mrs. Alben Berkley told reporters that she did not like to be addressed as "The Veepess": "Somehow or other it sounds like a snake. I guess I connect it with theword viper. I'd really much rather be called Mrs. Veep."

Mrs. Suzy Harris Rytting, 22, explained why she was back in Salt Lake City with her husband instead of in the Alps with the U.S. Women's Olympic ski team. On a visit to a Swiss doctor during the tryouts, she was surprised to learn that she was one month pregnant. Surprised and shocked, sourpuss U.S. Olympic officials brusquely scratched her name and ordered her home. In Manhattan, the U.S. Olympic Committee called Suzy's summary treatment "regrettable," promised to send her a letter of apology.

The fact that Averell Harriman lost his dog Fifi in Paris and asked the French police to help find her appeared to shock a Pravda reporter, who cabled home a disapproving story: "Harriman and his compatriots have taken over France to such a degree that they consider it completely normal to mobilize the Paris police for a week to search for a lost dachshund."

In Manhattan, Old Soldier Douglas MacArthur and former staff officers celebrated his 72nd birthday with a stag party. He admitted to a reporter that his former Commander in Chief Harry Truman had failed to note the day with a greeting, added that one of his favorite fighting men was still Lucius Aemilius Paulus, the Roman consul sent to fight the Macedonians in 168 B.C., who turned on his critics and told them either to come to Macedonia and fight with him or stay home and be quiet. Said Mac Arthur: "If I chance to meet Lucius Aemilius Paulus in the hereafter, I will be most happy to assure him that conditions have not materially changed in the world 1,900 and more years after the birth of Christ."

Asked if he questioned the right of the Senate to change its legislative mind, Arkansas' Senator William Fulbright said: "We have the power to do any damn fool thing we want to do, and we seem to do it about every ten minutes."

Roses & Thorns

The mayor of Isnello, Sicily announced that his village (pop. 4,107) would soon have a new public shower bath, thanks to New York City's Mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri, who sent over $2,400 for the installation after visiting his birthplace last fall.

At London's Tate Gallery, the public had a chance to see the second portrait done by British Landscape Painter Graham Sutherland: a study of walnut-faced Publisher Lord Beaverbrook in a grimly pleasant mood. The Beaver agreed to sit for the portrait, a 72nd birthday present from his staff last year, after he saw and admired Sutherland's first attempt at portraiture: a haggard, cynical Somerset Maugham.

In Manhattan, white-haired Mrs. Evyleen Cronin, 59, Tallulah Banlchead's onetime secretary, who was charged with kiting $4,284 worth of checks and convicted of second-degree grand larceny (TIME, Dec. 24), came into court to hear her sentence: indefinite probation, because of her age and health, instead of a possible six-year prison term. It was fair enough, said Plaintiff Tallulah: "I did my duty as a citizen, the jury did its duty, and now I'm sure the judge has done his. You get so mad you could spit, as they say--you'd like to kill someone--but when it comes right down to it, you don't really, you know, dahling."

In Portland, Ore., Ethel Waters, 51, announced that after five more months on the road with Member of the Wedding, and one more movie, she might retire: "I'm old, I'm human and I'm tired. I'm going to see if I can live on my social security. Right now I don't make enough to pay both my bills and my taxes."

Physical Culture

In Hollywood, Lana Turner, who did her bit to make the public sweater-conscious, poured her well-known curves into a different mold, gave photographers a new waistline pose. Trussed almost breathless in a Gay Nineties corset, Lana said: "Girls with hourglass figures set off by those tiny waists had the right idea if beau-catching was their idea."

In Manhattan, New York University proudly announced its new women's swimming coach: two-way Channel Swimmer Florence Chadwick.

American High Commissioner to Germany John J. McCloy, who likes his off-duty muscle-flexing (tennis, touch football), took his wife & two children for skiing on Kreuzeck Mountain in the Bavarian Alps. First day out, McCloy took a tumble, finished the run on rescue sled and cable car, boarded his special train to Munich, where Army doctors announced he had a minor ankle fracture.

Life and Health magazine asked Iran's Premier Mossadegh for some health hints, printed a reply by the Premier titled "How I Keep Going." Sample: "I must remind my readers that the mental state is more important in the preservation of health than the physical. Hence, having pure thoughts helps a great deal in preserving health."

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