Spiro, Won't You Please Come Home?

Whatever detractors the Vice President may have in the U.S., there is a tiny corner of the earth where Spiro Agnew can do no wrong--the Greek town of Gargaliani. Agnew's father emigrated from there to America 72 years ago, changing his name from Anagnostopoulos and becoming a U.S. citizen. As a first-generation native American, Spiro never spoke his father's native tongue (his mother was American) and is more attuned to Lawrence Welk than to the bouzouki. But in Gargaliani, blood, not tongue, is what matters: the Vice President is revered as a local boy who made good. TIME Correspondent Bonnie Angela visited Gargaliani and filed this report:

THE Vice President's ancestral village lies eight hours away from Athens over a narrow, bumpy country road. It sits in the sunshine on the western slopes of the Greek division of Peloponnesus, six hairpin curves above the ink blue Ionian Sea, an immaculate whitewash of stucco structures with red tile roofs.

To the 7,600 residents of Gargaliani, Spiro Agnew is one of their own. His portrait hangs in a place of honor in the town hall, larger than that of Greece's Prime Minister or of the exiled King Constantine. Acting Mayor Nicholas Horaites produces with a flourish copies of congratulatory notes sent by the town council to Agnew--each cable misspelling his name in a different way.

In the town square, men gather beneath plane trees to sip retsina, a resin-flavored wine. They see a photographer and nod knowingly to each other: "Spiro." At the corner of Aristotle and Socrates streets stands a house built some 200 years ago by an earlier Anagnostopoulos. Spiro's cousin, Andreas, a quiet, naturally dignified man, lives on the second floor with his family.

Andreas recalls that "Spiro's grandfather was rich by Gargaliani standards." He was a notary public, which carried legal duties and status in 19th century Greece. "But during the Balkan Wars of 1912-13," recalls Andreas, "there was a financial crisis." Without a trace of self-pity, Andreas explains that "though the family was financially broken, our pride and honor kept us from making crooked deals. Therefore we are poor."

A few pieces of furniture from the grandfather remain in the house, which is kept spotless by Andreas' wife. She is a perfect Greek counterpart of Judy Agnew--bright, outgoing, hospitable, gay. As the man who revived the family ties by writing to Agnew, Andreas has become the spokesman for the Anagnostopoulos family. "We have become known figures," says Andreas proudly. "I receive letters from Greeks living in Paris, Venezuela, Australia, who are pleased that a Greek was elected to such a high office."

His new-found fame by association with the American Vice President has also brought some disappointment. Andreas, who owns the town's hardware store, was invited to attend the National Hardware Show in New York City. It was an exciting prospect, but once the all-expenses-paid invitation was offered, there was suddenly no further word from any of his prospective hosts in America, and he did not go.

Andreas' son Democritas, whose short hair and well-pressed neatness would certainly appeal to Agnew, has been deeply affected by his cousin's fame. "Now he has a name." says his father, "a dream to live up to." Democritas is a high school senior and has ambitions to be an accountant. He hopes to win the $1,000 scholarship that Agnew established in his grandfather's memory for the youth of Gargaliani.

Among the town's hierarchy, few rank higher than 85-year-old Andrew Chyrsikos, another of Spiro's cousins. He is what the Greeks call a "Beenamerican," meaning that he lived in America and returned home again. He sailed away, in fact, with Spiro's father, and they shared a room in Schenectady, N.Y., before Theodore Anagnostopoulos moved to Baltimore. Now, sunning himself outside the town library, Chyrsikos likes to one-up Andreas by boasting that his sons in America have visited with Agnew--and even had their pictures taken with President Nixon.

Of course, the most pressing question in Gargaliani--other than the outcome of the olive harvest--is when Spiro will come home. He has promised in letters to Andreas to visit the town, but the townspeople are beginning to wonder, in the shrewd fashion of peasants, why he waits so long. The delicacies of international politics that must concern their American cousin--the presence of a military junta in Athens, the absence of a constitutional Parliament--are not easily explained to the good people of sunny Gargaliani.

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