By general agreement, Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson can outtalk any other ten Texans with one tongue tied behind his cheek—and last week, deep in the heart of Africa, he applied his skill on an international scale. Accompanied by his wife Lady Bird, Johnson turned up in Senegal to represent the U.S. at the first anniversary of the nation's independence. When he left a few days later, some tens of thousands of delighted Senegalese seemed ready to go all the way with L.B.J.
While a 17-member Soviet delegation sulked in its suites, Lyndon and Lady
Bird talked, smiled and handclasped their way through the Nebraska-sized country. They surprised everybody by getting up at 4:30 one morning and driving out of Dakar into the countryside. At the fishing town of Kayar, where the per capita income is $100, the Vice President held out hope: "The rural per capita income of Texas was only $180 in 1930, and today it is $1,800." Cried Lady Bird, catching sight of baskets piled high with peanuts: "Why it's just like Texas!"
Moments later, hurrying down the dusty street, she was followed by a swarm of flies and by a clatter of little girls who pleaded: "Juste cinq francs, madame!" Lady Bird bravely tried to show admiration for Kayar's tiny, windowless, wooden shacks and the village sewing machine, but as she confessed later: "What bothered me most was the fact that I knew we were leaving soon, but these people would have to go on living with these flies and in this poverty."
Farm Boy. While his doctor, appalled by the leprosy, tuberculosis, syphilis and jaundice rates, watched anxiously, Lyndon back-patted his way through the village crowds. Entering a hovel where fly-covered dried fish and a few tins were on display, he quipped, "Is this the supermarket?" To every family accompanied by children, he announced proudly that he and Lady Bird have a couple of teen-age daughters back home. When the natives expressed their thanks for his visit, L.B.J. allowed, "This is communication like in the garment district in New York or in Johnson City, Texas."
To Kayar's berobed village chief, Gurtil N'Doye, Lyndon said: "I came to Dakar for Independence Day festivities because of President Kennedy's deep interest in Africa, but I came to Kayar because I was a farm boy, too, in Texas. It's a long way from Texas to Kayar, but we both produce peanuts and both want the same thing: a higher standard of living for the people." The old chief, proud of the fact that such important visitors had come to his out-of-the-way village, beamed his thanks, suggested that perhaps President Kennedy could send over a few outboard motors for the community fishing boats. L.B.J. promised at least to send him a Johnson-motor for his own use.