Monday, Aug. 01, 1977
What a pleasure it was to see the two of them again in a great baseball park, clad in the classic threads of the trade that made them famous. The occasion was the 48th All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium, and this time Willie Mays and Joe DiMaggio were not flogging some TV product like Mr. Coffee or the sweet smell of Brut on a centerfielder's forearm. They were presiding as honorary captains. Looking back on it, "Joltin' Joe" couldn't help reflecting that no matter what else in the world changes, "baseball was played the same then." The "Say Hey Kid" got round to admitting that the fine, carefree way he used to run out from under his baseball cap when steaming around the bases was partly the result of calculation. Said Mays with a grin: "I always wore a cap a size too small." When the on-field action started, it turned out that the American League's ill luck hadn't turned either. The Nationals won, 7 to 5, for their sixth straight All-Star victory.
It is a far cry from their old six-room bungalow (purchase price: $19,000), but Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and his wife Ethel say they can learn to call their new digs home. The Bradleys moved last week into a gabled $600,000 Norman-style, 14-room mansion, complete with herringbone-brick patio and a reflecting pool. The house, built in 1921 in the city's Wilshire district, was once inhabited by Actor John Barrymore. The Getty Oil Co. took it over in 1967 and later donated it to the city, making Los Angeles the third major U.S. city (after New York and Detroit) with a private mayoral residence. As for maintaining the Bradleys' lavish new quarters, apparently taxpayers needn't worry. Regular city workers will staff occasional parties without straining the municipal budget. In fact, because the mayor used to rent expensive hotel ballrooms to entertain dignitaries, the city may even save some money. All in all, the price was right. Says Bradley: "This was an offer we couldn't refuse."
The good ole boys and girls got together for some square dancing, rebel yells and twanging bluegrass. Their down-home host, Jimmy Carter, had invited his Georgia staffers and members of Congress and their families to a backyard barbecue at the White House. The excuse for the party, explained the First Lady, was "to get children to meet Amy," who sat gleefully with the rest of trie small fry at the magic show. Guests Bert Lance, Tip O'Neill, Mark Hatfield and James Sehlesinger munched hot dogs and hamburgers, enjoying various attractions: a clutch of clowns, an old-fashioned calliope and the Washington Redskins playing volleyball. The high spot of the party came when Jimmy, Wife Rosalynn and Amy deftly do-si-doed with the Dixie Liners. Sweating profusely but smiling nonstop, Jimmy padded about in Wallabees and issued a presidential directive: "Y'all have a good time."
Bombs exploded and demonstrators round the world marched in protest on Aug. 23, 1927, the day Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were executed in a Massachusetts electric chair. In the half-century since, the case of the "good shoemaker" and the "poor fish peddler" has continued to stir men's passions. Generations of Americans have wrangled bitterly over whether or not the two admitted anarchists were guilty of shooting two men during a holdup and whether they received a fair trial. Last week Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis signed a proclamation officially stating that Sacco and Vanzetti had indeed been denied a fair trial. Sidestepping the issue of guilt or innocence, the Governor declared "the atmosphere at their trial and appeals was permeated by prejudice against foreigners and hostility toward unorthodox political views." Added Dukakis: "Sacco and Vanzetti would not have wanted to be pardoned, even if it were possible; for they maintained their innocence to the end. They asked not for mercy but for justice."
"When doctors hear about me, they wonder if they have chosen the right course," says Doctor-Turned-Businessman Armand Hammer. The celebrated 79-year-old Russophile and art collector is the chairman of Occidental Petroleum. He graduated from Columbia Medical School 56 years ago, but has never practiced medicine. While still a medical student, Hammer made his first million selling Pharmaceuticals. Later he worked in the Soviet Union, eventually building up a rich import-export business with the Soviets. At 59, he took over Occidental. Figuring that he would recycle some oil money into his original profession, Hammer last week donated $5 million to Columbia for cancer research, one of the largest private gifts Columbia has ever received. Says Hammer with a smile: "Being a businessman has enabled me to do more good than I could have as a doctor."
Down Under, on a sprawling 16,000-acre ranch, Michael Kennedy, 19, gamely tried to brand cattle, herd sheep and, noted an observer, "had a go at everything." But what the third son of the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy really wants to have a go at is salvaging Uncle John's World War II patrol boat, PT109. The boat is thought to lie in 1,400 ft. of water off the Solomon Islands, where it was sunk by a Japanese destroyer in 1943. J.F.K.'s heroic part in the survival of his crew became a legend that contributed notably to his political career. When young Michael learned of an Australian effort to find and hoist up the remains of PT109, he set off to meet with the adventurers. His special dream: to see artifacts--or maybe even the hulk itself--installed some day in the new Kennedy Library.
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