An Early Start

Maryland's political sweepstakes are run on a long, hard, fast track. Two contestants are already driving hard for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination to be decided in June's Democratic primary.

P: Harry Clifton ("Curly") Byrd,* the University of Maryland's football coach (1913-34) and president (1936-53), has organized a 100-man campaign executive committee headed by former Governor Preston Lane.

P: George P. Mahoney, twice defeated, once for the Senate and once for governor, never stopped running after election day 1952, has shaken every hand he can find from Buffalo Run to Pocomoke City. A third candidate, Thomas D'Alesandro, Democratic National Committeeman and mayor of Baltimore, announced his candidacy for governor last August, but slipped behind when his son was implicated in a teen-age vice scandal. Last week D'Alesandro withdrew from the race.

* No kin to Virginia's Senator Harry Flood Byrd.

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