Names make news. Last week these names made this news:
After a weekend spent with his folks in Zebulon, N.C.. Margaret Truman, 32, returned to Manhattan with 43-year-old E. Clifton Daniel Jr., to be met by newsmen insistent for word of romance from them. Grinning, but ducking the big question, they taxied away together. Half an hour later, in a hastily called press conference in Independence, Mo., Papa Harry Truman gave out the happy word that Margaret was engaged to marry "Cliff" Daniel, onetime London and Moscow cor respondent and now assistant foreign editor of The New York Times. Papa Harry not only gave them his blessing, but also took care of the wedding announcement: some time in April in Independence.
Playing and working in Phoenix, Ariz., energetic Inventor Lee de Forest, 82, one of radio's and TV's most illustrious ancestors predicted: 1) the world will run out of fissionable power-producing uranium within several hundred years; 2) a successful fusion reactor, i.e., a tamed H-bomb type of power generator, will never be achieved; 3) it matters not, because solar energy will eventually outshine both fission and fusion sources as man's chief power supply. These,matters settled, Dr. de Forest sounded off on the horrors of present-day radio and TV advertising. "I wish my 'children' wouldn't speak and show such long commercials," snapped he. "I hear we will face $2 billion worth of cartoons and beer ads this year. God help us!"
Crybaby Crooner Johnnie (The Little White Cloud That Cried) Ray was close to real tears in Australia after a wild and wooly welcome from adoring teen-age fans. Ray, a veteran of Down-Under tours, sagged in a chair at Sydney's airport following a grating big hello from kids who smashed down barricades to get at him. Ripped: his shirt and coat. Lost: his tie, hanky and decorum.
In a state abounding in race tracks and bettors who also vote, Maryland's Republican Senator J. Glenn Beall has long found political expedience a pleasure when rubbing shoulders with his constituents in grandstands and boxes. In recent years, reported syndicated King Features Columnist George Dixon, Bettor Beall has applied a "wisdom of the ages" in a totally unscientific system that has won two spectacular daily doubles. Five years ago Senator Beall slapped down $2 on Nos. 5 & 6, lit up himself as the tote board lit up with news that he had won $780. Asked a man in the next box: "How did you figure out five and six?" Replied Beall to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover: "I just bet my age. I'm 56." Groaned Hoover: "I always bet my age, too, but we got here just a minute late today. I'm 56, too!" Not long ago Beall, now 61, placed $5 on six and one, raked in a whopping $1,522.50. That same day he met a Hoover assistant. Crowed the FBI man: "The boss and I were both on it too! We've never forgotten the lesson you taught us."