For the first time in Fairbanks, Alaska's history, and to a mixed chorus of sourdough howls and cheers, a half-Eskimo local girl, Minnie Motschman, 20, was voted "Miss Alaska" 1940. A clerk in a Fairbanks woman's wear store, ebon-haired Miss Motschman got a free trip to Washington. Commented a local liberal: "The most progressive move in Alaska since Soapy Smith-- was plugged." Quitting his Vatican observatory after an evening of star gazing, absent-minded Professor Father John Stein forgot to switch off the lights, left them blazing like a beacon over blacked-out Rome. Summoned by a flood of protests, Vatican City firemen broke open the door, doused the gleaming glim.

In El Paso, Marie Terese Retain, 83, French-born widow of a Texas physician, said of her brother-in-law, the 84-year-old Premier of France: "He is too old for his present responsibility. He should not have taken it."

At Trenton, N. J. before a Department of Immigration examiner, Dr. Albert Einstein, 61, took his final examination, demonstrated his knowledge of U. S. Government, was promised his final citizenship papers in 90 days. Asked whether he was pleased at the prospect of U. S. citizenship, Dr. Einstein happily replied: "Sure, sure, who wouldn't be?"

From Berlin the Chicago Tribune's Sigrid Schultz reported that in Adolf Hitler's spare time at the front he has been sketching a new architecture worthy of "victorious Germany": a softening of rigid, strictly utilitarian lines with gayer, rococo curves.

To Peace Haven, the Long Island mansion where the Royal Fraternity of Master Metaphysicians are bringing up their ward, Jean--and hope to render her immune to death by sheltering her forever from human misery--went Austrian Prince John von Starhemberg, 2, child of exiled Prince Ernst Rudiger von Starhemberg. Sorrow is an old story to him. When the two met (see cut), Prince John wept. Year-old Jean wavered, then stayed true to her training, laughed.

Criticizing 5,718 Philadelphia high-school seniors for not knowing Latin, Pennsylvania's Governor Arthur H.

James tried to quote his own school motto, came out with "Omnia labora vinces," looked puzzled as students roared.* Because she was traveling on an Italian passport with her producer-husband Monty Banks (born Mario Bianchi), technically an enemy alien, blowzy British Cine-comedienne Gracie Fields, C. B. E., was halted by Canadian immigration authorities, given a two-hour grilling before being granted a two-month-stay permit, allowed to continue to California.

At a meeting in London to discuss home defense, Clement Davies, M. P. stormed: "Any schoolboy who can throw a cricket ball can throw a bomb. Women should have grenades with which to defend their homes and babies." -- Correct: "Labor omnia vincit."

* Famed conman and gambler, shot in 1898 in a Skagway brawl. * Correct "Labor omnia vincit."

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