Monday, Apr. 20, 1953

Married. Princess Josephine Charlotte, 25, sister of Belgium's King Baudouin; and Crown Prince Jean, 32, heir apparent to the throne of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg (pop. 300,000); in Luxembourg. The wedding, carried off in lavish, old-style pageantry in spite of rain, drew a glittering collection of guests: three kings, three queens, a grand duchess, an archduke, 22 princes, 18 princesses, and assorted lesser nobility. Royal feathers were momentarily ruffled when Princess de Rethy, commoner wife of Belgium's abdicated King Leopold III (father of the bride), got uncommonly close to the head of the procession. But a good time seemed to be had by the 100,000 soggy Luxembourgers and tourists who goggled, cheered and shot off skyrockets.

Married. Sir Alexander Fleming, 71, Nobel Prizewinning discoverer of penicillin; and Mrs. Amalia Coutsouris, 40, a fellow microbe-hunter and Greek underground heroine; both for the second time; in London.

Divorced. By Kathleen (Forever Amber) Winsor, 34, brunette bestselling authoress: her third husband, Attorney Arnold Krakower, 37; after four years of marriage, no children; in Juarez, Mexico.

Died. Dr. Cyril Edwin Mitchinson Joad, 61, popular philosopher, author (The Book of Joad, The Testament of Joad and 46 other serious-to-potboiling books), University of London professor; of cancer; in London. Puffin-shaped, goat-bearded and brilliantly voluble ("I can explain anything to anybody"), C. E. M. Joad was variously a socialist, pacifist, patriot, agnostic, advocate of free love, polygamy, euthanasia, suicide and easy divorce, and a professional carper. On scientific progress: "The superman made the plane, but the ape has got hold of it." On religion: "Why, if God so loves us, does He give us such a hell of a time?" For the America he visited only once, Philosopher Joad reserved special acid: "What a genius Americans have for coming into war late, on the winning side." A lifelong fame-seeker, (most famous remark: "Thank God, I am famous!"), Joad talked students of the Oxford Union into resolving (in 1933) that they would under no circumstances fight for king and country, later soared to great popular heights as the life and soul of the BBC's quiz panel, "Brains Trust." In his later years, he veered back to religion (the Anglican Church), confessed that "Christianity works better than any thing else I have heard of."

Died. Malvina ("Tommy") Thompson, 61, longtime (since 1928) personal secretary to Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, who once described her as "the person who makes life possible for me"; of a heart ailment; in Manhattan.

Died. Hugo Sperrle, 68, German field marshal who directed the 1940 aerial blitz of London; in Munich. Massive, monocled and elaborately uniformed, Sperrle flashed almost as many medals as his boss Reich Marshal Hermann Goring. He helped organize the Luftwaffe, probably did as much as any man in setting the pattern for aerial combat in World War II. Judged not guilty of war crimes and "non-concerned" about Naziism, he lived out his days quietly in Landsberg.

Died. Gano Dunn, 82, international construction tycoon, longtime (since 1913) president of the J. G. White Engineering Corp., whose monuments include Pearl Harbor's naval oil base, the Muscle Shoals steam plant and a string of Latin American power dams; in Manhattan.

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