PEOPLE

Now, how can a guy hope to become a hero as a University of New Mexico fullback when he knows that every sports headline writer is secretly hoping he never makes the starting lineup? Well, never mind them, just get in there and play your heart out, Saleutogi Lanititi Letuligasenoa.

Our Tell It Like It Is Award goes to Matador Adrian Romero, who earned two ears and two triumphant laps around the arena after a fight in Tijuana. Said Romero at a San Diego luncheon before his engagement: "What I like best about bullfighting is the big money and small bulls."

Pretty Gloria Jean (Jackie) Jackson, 5'7" and 130 pounds, hopes to be the first woman to break into organized baseball—and she tried out a week or so ago with the Pittsfield, Mass. Senators. According to Senator Owner Pat McKernan, Jackie could field a ball all right, but she couldn't seem to hit one. Too bad? No. Enter Walter Brock, who owns the Raleigh-Durham Triangles of the Class A Carolina League. Brock offered Jackie a contract to play first base for the rest of the season and Jackie started packing. Then Minor League President Phil Piton telephoned Brock, making familiar noises about turning baseball into "a travesty" and the offer was withdrawn. "She's a pretty girl; I thought it might increase attendance," said Brock. So as things stand now, male chauvinist Piton is happy, Brock is disappointed and Jackie is still looking for a job.

Mark A. Inserra is driving along peacefully in Omaha when a 16-pound bowling ball comes rattling down a hilly side street and scores a strike on his car, causing over $100 damage. No one claimed the ball.

Meanwhile, over in Bryant, Iowa, farmer Tom Kruse pens up his hogs for about six months fattening before sending them to market. But the hogs get bored and bite each other's tails. Kruse has heard that hogs can be kept amused for hours playing with bowling balls. He's looking for rejects. Over to you, Mark.

Never a dull moment at the Charles Town (W. Va.) Turf Club, where the waitresses have taken to jogging around the track to lose weight (SI, Aug. 9). A few nights ago, before the regular program, the club staged the first annual $1,500-added Hot Pants Handicap. Let it be noted, for thoroughbred records, that Betty Biller won the one-eighth-mile event in 34 seconds, finishing 10 lengths ahead of Geraldine Scott. Early leader Andrea Harris fell in the homestretch, came up lame and failed to show. Customers were so bemused by the spectacle that when the regular races started, the betting handle was way down.

American Jockey Pete Anderson was officially vacationing in England, but someone asked him to ride, and you know how jockeys are. So he won the Longshore Handicap at Yarmouth on a horse named Capistrano, beating out the favored English entry, Alcindoro. Anderson's last memorable win was on Cavan in the Belmont Stakes way back in 1958. Wrote Tony Jakobson of England's Sporting Life: "Anderson was so thrilled with his win...that he had to be restrained from coming out of the weighing room to meet the press wearing only a towel!"

Listen, Pete, you wear any old thing you want. After all, you're on vacation, remember?

Fifty kids, 14 and under, have joined the track program organized in Miami by Bob McTeak, whose daughter Charlene recently ran the 220-yard dash in 55.2, setting a new record. Charlene also broke the 440 record and then held her first press conference. "I wike to win wibbons," said 5-year-old Charlene.

Let a pretty young thing come along and, sure enough, a horse will react just like a People. Doing that very human double take in the picture above is Friar Tuck, a Canadian hunter. The other horse is a $15,000 papier-m√¢ché statue being delivered to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. Friar Tuck is hoping for an introduction and trying to think of something snappy to say, like: "Haven't we met before? I can't remember your name, but your pace is familiar."

A former featherweight boxer from Minnesota, 70-year-old Augie Ratner, has advertised his own funeral in the personal column, not because death seems imminent—he never felt better—but because he would like to know what "the official attendance" will be. Someone pointed out that friends who respond to the ad may go before he does. "I'll just have to go through the file, adding and subtracting," says Augie. "It docs sort of put a man under obligation, doesn't it?"

This is positively the last report on the kooky happenings in Memphis. First it was Dennis, the youth who donned twigs and leaves and announced he was a tree (SI, Aug. 9). Now along comes Memphis Fire Chief Charles Torian, who has taken to hiding firemen in fake trees to nab false alarmists. So far the agents concealed in their wire, wood and canvas trees have captured 20 miscreants. Might have caught more, too, but the trees are used only at night because "they are not perfect replicas."

TWO PHOTOS