In-Between Senators

Representing their electorates last week were three Senators who will never know what it is like to fidget through a filibuster. Reason: they were elected to fill vacancies from November 9 through January 2, and the Senate will not sit until January 3.

With her mother, a stenographer and a clerk, grey-haired, bustling Interim Senator Gladys Pyle (Rep.) drove all the way from South Dakota to Washington "because," she said, "I wouldn't feel like a Senator unless I did." First woman to serve in the South Dakota Legislature, Senator Pyle was a candidate for Governor two years ago. As soon as she arrived in Washington, she personally screwed her nameplate on the door of her temporary office; spoke at a luncheon of the Republican National Committee; had a look at the Capitol; hurried down to the Interior Department to discuss "South Dakota problems"; drew doodles on a pink Senate memo pad. "This life," she exclaimed, "is a hectic whirl."

Interim Senator Alexander Grant Barry (Rep.) from Oregon spent about as much money getting elected as he will be paid for serving ($1,511.12, plus $1,818 for five clerks' salaries and $18.75 for stationery). A Portland lawyer and one-time State Liquor Commissioner, Senator Barry worries more about his girth than a Senator ought to. His successor, full-time Senator Rufus C. Holman, will be the fourth Senator in the seat within eleven months.

Plump, ruddy-faced Interim Senator Thomas More Storke (Dem.) of California is editor and publisher of the Santa Barbara News-Press. He has long been such a close friend of his neighbor, Senator-reject William Gibbs McAdoo, that California papers call him "Deputy Senator." In Washington he knew enough not to take the 20 job-hunting letters he received every day too seriously. Instead he read Jim Farley's instructive autobiography, dined with friends at the Shoreham Hotel, danced to his favorite tune-- The Last Roundup. "This is just a honey-moon," he said.

Meanwhile, in Minneapolis, Minn., one-time Interim Senator Guy Victor Howard totted up the financial and political rewards of the two months he served in 1936-37. His accomplishments, he said, were to 1) land a couple of WPA projects, 2) help a man get out of jail, 3) get some Congressional Directories and Capitol calendars for friends back home. His rewards: he has enough stationery to last the rest of his natural life; he gets invited out a lot more than he used to be. "For instance," he says, "I now go to two or three funerals a week."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.