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PEOPLE
For two and a half years Carl E. Killion, president of the Illinois State Beekeepers Association, has been buzzing around trying to get the Government to issue a commemorative stamp for the honeybee. Killion was stung recently when a postage stamp was issued in behalf of bowling, and he said so in a letter to Postmaster General Winton M. Blount. "I am puzzled," he wrote, "as to why a citizens' advisory committee would give a man-made object such as the bowling ball priority over the world's most useful insect."
Mr. Killion might get a clue from this recent scene at the Executive Office Building, where Richard Milhous Nixon showed off his presidential alley skills last week. The President rolled only two balls—the first one went into the gutter, the second down the middle for a strike. Said Mr. Nixon, "I'm going to quit while I'm ahead." Whoops. Take another look, Mr. President. The only thing you're ahead of right here is the foul line.
After 30 years, Ziggy the Elephant is getting sprung from solitary. Ziggy, who lives at Brookfield Zoo near Chicago, is now the oldest (54), largest (13,440 pounds) and probably grouchiest pachyderm in captivity. Back in 1941 he threw one of his keepers to the ground four times, establishing a new Brookfield record. That landed Ziggy in isolation, where he's been ever since. Three years ago a group of elephant lovers raised $46,000 to build an outdoor pen for Ziggy, so he can get some fresh air when he wants to. The pen has big steel doors and walls that are painted sky blue, which will soon be decorated with murals of Asian foothills. Says Dr. Peter Crowcroft, the zoo director: "Ziggy can now spend the rest of his life under very pleasant conditions." Maybe so, but Dr. Crowcroft might want to reconsider those Asian foothills. Suppose Ziggy doesn't like foothills.
Conductor Erich Leinsdorf showed up in Houston the other day to begin rehearsals for the opening of the local symphony season, but music took second fiddle to another Leinsdorf love: baseball. "I'm an old Dodger fan from way back," he said. "And I like to see good pitchers, amazing pitchers like that fellow Blue." Aw, Erich, Rhapsody to Blue in the Astros' own backyard? Shame on you.
Leroy (Satchel) Paige has had quite a summer. First, he made the Baseball Hall of Fame, and now here he is out on the tennis courts at a sports celebrity tournament in the Catskills, fogging them in there. Well, maybe not exactly fogging them, but at least keeping them in play and serving with a distinctive sidearm delivery. So he didn't win. "I played baseball winter and summer for 40 years," said Satch. "When did I ever have time to play tennis?"
A bunch of the boys were whooping it up in a Manhattan tower last week just before the Buchanan-Laguna fight at Madison Square Garden. The boys? Well, Carmen Basilio, Joey Giardello, Jake LaMotta and Willie Pep, to name a few of the ex-ring celebrities who gathered to reminisce. Between rounds of coffee and cake, Pep began philosophizing on the state of the art. "The trouble with the fight game is Vietnam," opined Pep. "After every war we get a whole bunch of good fighters. You end the war and get these guys home and you'll see."
Here we go with the name game again. Would you believe a 240-pound tackle at Southern Methodist named D. Nady? Why not, you ask? Well, then, how about his brothers (yup) X. and J.?
And then there's Air Force Academy Fullback Kevin Brennan, whose name problem is all relative. Brennan is the brother of Terry Brennan, tackle on the 1969 Notre Dame team, but no relation to Terry Brennan, the former Notre Dame coach. The Brennan boys are, however, nephews of former Notre Dame Halfback Johnny Lattner, who won the 1953 Heisman Trophy when he played halfback at South Bend and who now runs a restaurant in Chicago. One member of Kevin Brennan's squadron at the Academy is Cadet Johnny Lattner from Dubuque, Iowa, who is not related to either the Brennans or the other Johnny Lattner. Nor to ex-Coach Brennan. Got all that?
Breakthrough-of-the-Week award goes to Dr. Steve Thorpe of the British National Institute of Oceanography, who has found a Loch Ness monster that is not really a monster at all. It is a big wave rolling under the surface that just acts like one. It takes 56 hours to travel across, and is reinforced by a strong wind that blows every 2½ days. Sure, Doc. And it has red eyes and little green feet and....
Last week, while his grandfather, the King, was off on vacation, Sweden's Crown Prince Carl Gustaf took over as acting monarch and promptly got his country rolling again. A sports car buff who has not been seen riding a bicycle in years, the prince nevertheless climbed aboard a two-wheeler in Stockholm and led the field through part of the first lap of a bike race, pulling nimbly aside after 850 meters and letting the 60-odd competitors pedal past. Look, it's better than staging a coup.
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