Doris Goes to Washington

Once before, when she was only twelve, round-faced Doris Ann Hall of Hudson, N.C. had worked her way up to the finals of the National Spelling Bee, put on each year in Washington, D.C. by the Scripps-Howard newspapers. But that time, with 30 other contestants still left, she had muffed the word condign and gone down to defeat. This year, when she found that she was to be in the finals, she made up her mind: she was going to win.

As far back as November, Doris Hall, 13 and a big girl for her age, went into training. She persuaded her teacher to excuse her from some of her routine school-work in the eighth grade (she still got straight As), and she began thumbing through Webster's Collegiate Dictionary at the rate of 50 pages a day. When she had finished the dictionary once, she started all over again, making long lists of words she was still not sure of. Then, just to make certain, she began combing Mademoiselle, the Atlantic Monthly, TIME and The New Yorker for unusual words.

28 Down . . . Finally, last week, the Big Test came, and 51 boys & girls--the pick of 4 1/2 million--nervously lined up in the auditorium of the Department of Commerce. The first words were easy, at least to Doris Ann--assonance . . . homily . . . camellia. But by the end of the fifth round, 28 contenders had been spelled down. Gradually the words got harder--depilatory . . . asthmatic . . . contumacious . , . and one by one the victims fell. At one point, Doris Ann thought that she too was a goner: she spelled hegira with a "j". But after consulting the dictionary, the judges found that hejira was a correct alternative. By round 23 Doris Ann was still standing--with only two other girls left.

The three stood fast for five more rounds. Then one girl missed herbaceous. After that, with only two left, the rules changed a bit: to win, the contestant had to spell not only whatever word her opponent happened to miss, but the next word on the list as well.

Up to that point. Doris Ann had been lucky. She had taken each word slowly, often asking the pronouncer to repeat it for her. But her opponent, Marjorie Foliart of Crafton, Pa., was a speller who could go both forwards and backwards. To add to the tension, the spelling bee suddenly had a visitation: Secretary of Commerce Charles Sawyer came down from his office to witness the final rounds.

One to Go . . . As the words flew by --retrousse . . . shibboleth . . . oleaginous . . .--Doris Ann hardly knew what they all meant. Finally came cicerone, which Doris Ann thought had a final "i". Marjorie got it right, but she promptly missed farraginous. Doris Ann got that one right, but she still had one more word to go before she could claim the winning $500 and the free trip to New York.

The word she got was vignette, and Doris Ann took her time. "V." she began . . .". . . i . . ." Then she cautiously added a "g". Finally, in one glorious last spurt she cried "N-E-T-T-E," and before she knew it. Secretary Sawyer was on his way to the platform to shake her trembling hand.

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