PEOPLE

"He loves the game and has a peculiar interest in statistics," says Owner Bob Short of the new man in the Senators' front office. The characteristics sound like those of any baseball nut, but apparently David Eisenhower possesses them in staggering abundance and so was invited to put them to use this summer compiling the Senators' daily statistics, keeping records on farm team players and writing press releases. It's a 9-to-5 deal, plus night work and traveling. Eisenhower's salary has not been disclosed but, as he says, "I would have taken this job for nothing."

"Even when the pitcher is standing around hanging on to the ball, I find that exciting," says Maurice Kaplow, conductor for the Pennsylvania Ballet and former member of the Philadelphia Orchestra. A 6', 190-pound "frustrated athlete," Kaplow was explaining how he happened to bid $130 at a theater benefit for 10 minutes of batting practice with the Philadelphia Phillies. He grew up in Cleveland, playing the violin and juggling allegiances to the Indians and Jascha Heifetz. "I'd sneak out and play the outfield sometimes," he says. "My father, who was a fiddler, too, used to check my fingers, but he never said anything." So after all these years is Kaplow looking like a Babe Ruth Manqué? Well, says Phillie Coach Doc Edwards, who pitched during Kaplow's batting practice stint, "The man has a great personality."

Until last week Buddy Blattner, the Kansas City Royals broadcaster, had missed only one game broadcast in more than 20 years, but now he's missed another. The first was last summer when one of his daughters was married, and the second was last week for another daughter, another wedding. Debbie stands just under 6 feet and plays center for the University of Kansas women's basketball team. Bridegroom Doug Knop has won three straight Big Eight discus titles for Kansas. "Whenever and wherever he wants to get married is all right with me," Blattner told the Royals. "When someone who is 6'2", weighs 260 pounds and has a 19-inch neck asks for anything, he gets it."

Edward Heath, Britain's leader of the Opposition, is a serious sailor (SI, Aug. 18), and there was a speculative stir in Fleet Street when the 53-year-old bachelor included Miss Joan McKee, herself a real sailing buff, in his crew for a 50-mile outing in his yacht Morning Cloud. Miss McKee was just going to help out with the cooking—so it wasn't her fault the Morning Cloud ran aground.

The well-known bank director Casey Stengel, who unaccountably was not invited to that businessman's dinner at the White House, had this to say recently about the state of the nation's economy. "You see," he explained, "gold used to be the thing. They had it in Kentucky. Now it's all over the world, it's international, and they'd like to get it back. It's a serious thing. Some people think money's in the ground now, though—that stuff they call oil—but it isn't, see. The gold's over there, and we got to catch it on the way back. Then we'd get it down and everybody could come in and borrow money and I'd like it better. It's all so simple. What we got to do is catch the gold on the way back."

Five fathers were selected as fathers of the year this, the 35th time around—Frank Borman, the Reverend Leon H. Sullivan of Philadelphia's Zion Baptist Church, Bowie Kuhn, Jack Nicklaus and Joe Garagiola. At the awards luncheon Garagiola observed of his baseball career, "It's not a record, but being traded four times when there are only eight teams in the league tells you something. I thought I was modeling uniforms for the National League." Perhaps that is what made Joe so clothes-conscious—he was nattily clad in a brown blazer and plaid slacks designed by Hardy Amies, who is somewhat better known as a designer to Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth.

"Tennis and a bit of swimming are my summer sports," Peggy Fleming reports. "I've just had a few tennis lessons, four or five years ago. My fiancé plays about the same way I do." She and fiancé Greg Jenkins will be married next week, and if pottering about the court is all their tennis amounts to it's O.K. with Peggy. "The main thing is just to get out in the fresh air," she says. "A skater is indoors all the time on that artificial ice. We never even get a suntan—maybe that's why skaters don't look much like athletes at all."

"Old shotputters never die," says Otis Chandler, "they only get weak." It is true that the 42-year-old publisher of the Los Angeles Times had just heaved the 16-pound shot 46'7¾", a distance somewhat short of his 57'4¼" best in 1950. On the other hand, that 1950 throw was an NCAA record for a mere 10 minutes. This year's toss is finishing up its second week as a national seniors record, and so is Chandler's 150'10½" discus throw that bettered Fortune Gordien's year-old mark by almost three feet. Competing for the first time in 19 years, Chandler showed up 10 pounds under his best competitive weight of 230 and could not even recall when he had last put the shot, but he was heartened. "I'll give it a try again at the Coliseum," he said, "and if all goes well I'll enter the U.S. Masters in San Diego." He has set himself a goal of 50' for the shot and is even considering practicing.

TWO PHOTOS