To Roosevelt Forest

No spellbinder, Alf M. Landon did his most effective Kansas campaigning by putting on his oil-field breeches and windbreaker, climbing into his automobile, dropping in at country stores and farmhouses with a smiling, "I'm Alf Landon,'' sitting down for a talk about crops, weather and politics. Last week his first vacation trip in three years gave Alf Landon his first chance to display his close-range charm as Republican Presidential nominee.

In Topeka one evening Governor Landon, his wife, mother-in-law, three children and nurse climbed into a private railroad car furnished by a Union Pacific official, rolled off toward Colorado. Two Pullmans carried the Press. At every stop there were several hundred proud Kansans waiting to cheer the second Kansan ever nominated for the Presidency.-- "Hyah, Alf!" cried they as Nominee Landon appeared on the platform, grinning and waving, leaning down to pump outstretched hands. "It's mighty nice of you to come down to the station," drawled he to some. With others he exchanged news about the wheat crop or the grasshopper plague. By bedtime thousands of Kansans had been convinced that Alf Landon was still the same plain, friendly, likeable fellow he had always been.

In Denver early next morning Governor Edwin C. Johnson and Mayor Benjamin F. Stapleton, both Democrats, were at the station to greet Colorado's distinguished guest. The party piled into automobiles and, with Nominee Landon leaning out to shake hands wherever his car stopped, motored through Denver and out to a rented 1,200-acre ranch near Estes Park, in Roosevelt National Forest, where the Landon family was to spend the summer. In the big, low, rambling ranch-house that afternoon newshawks found the Republican nominee stretched out before a log fire in breeches and windbreaker, scratching away on a yellow pad at his acceptance speech. He would have to be back in Topeka on July 6 for a special session of Kansas' Legislature to deal with social security but meanwhile, he declared, he was going to have a good time fishing, riding and maybe climbing a mountain or two.

* First was John P. St. John, Prohibition candidate in 1884.

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