Even politicians go off the deep end, of course. Take Senator Lowell Weicker and Representative Bill Alexander, who began the August congressional recess with a three-day stay under water off Grand Bahama Island. The pair, both boosters of oceanic research, joined two scientists in the 16-ft. hydrolab operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Apart from a malfunction that sent the lab's temperature soaring to 90° at one point, the amateur aquanauts had little trouble adjusting to their watery environment, or to their spartan diet of soup, fruit, peanut butter and crackers. "Unlike the space program 15 years ago, the facilities already exist for expanded underwater research, and thus it can be done with a minimum of expense," enthused Weicker after bubbling to the surface. "Almost anyone can work down there —as my doing it proves."
Add one name to the list of Richard Nixon's secret campaign contributors —at least according to William A. Arnold, Nixon's first press secretary in Congress. In his memoir of the former President's early political career, Back When It All Began, Arnold tells of a Democratic Congressman who handed over a $1,000 personal check to Nixon's 1950 Senate campaign against Helen Gahagan Douglas. The donor: John F. Kennedy. "He explained that the check should be used in Nixon's campaign for Senator," writes Arnold, "and that its intention was partly due to admiration of Nixon and partly due to a preference for [then] Congressman Nixon over Congresswoman Douglas ..." Arnold says that he accepted the gift, but came to have some regrets a decade later "When Nixon and Kennedy were the opposing candidates for President," he reflects, "we could have used a photostat of that check to good advantage."
The beard looked a little suspicious from the start, and the chest hairs were certainly of dubious origin. No wonder, since the face behind the 5 o'clock shadow belonged to Actress Karen Black, 33, who had dressed up as a male homosexual for a film by Sherwin Tilton, 22, a student at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. Black, who collects up to $150,000 per picture these days, donated a spare Sunday to Tilton's project after he had asked her to be his leading lady in a $7,000 movie entitled Owen. She agreed, provided she could be a leading man instead. "It's an exciting challenge for an actress, and really fun trying to project the male outlook," said Black, who began her Hollywood acting career by playing semismart, bed-prone bimbos. "This is the only chance I'll probably ever have to play a man on the screen." Undoubtedly.