The Beautiful People

For the whole cast of the Robert Mitchum dope case, troubles kept multiplying. Having failed to get the marijuana indictment dismissed, the droopy-eyed film star and two codefendants, all pleading "not guilty," would have to stand trial. Two days after her courtroom appearance, Dancer Vickie Evans, who would get a further hearing on her dismissal plea, was picked up in a 3:30 a.m. raid on a gambling joint. The charge: vagrancy. Hinting that she was being persecuted, Vickie cried: "I'm through with Hollywood. I want to go home to Philadelphia." Starlet Lila Leeds was being sued for return of a $1,000 engagement ring by an ex-fiance who had been trying, without success, to get either the ring or Lila. At week's end Mitchum's attorney, Jerry Giesler, drove into a tree, suffered broken ribs and "profound shock." Meanwhile, Variety noted that the latest Mitchum movie, RKO's Rachel and the Stranger, was No. 1 at the nation's box offices.

Shopman Douglas, 20, pretty blonde daughter of the U.S. Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, was keeping company in London with one of the realm's most eligible nobles: the Marquess of Blandford, 22. They were seen together at dinner, at dancing, and over afternoon milkshakes at the embassy canteen. They were seen together at the movies (where a photographer snapped them seated next to Clement Attlee's son Martin--see cut). What excited the gossips was the hint of a triangle: the tall young Guardsman was supposed to have another girl--Princess Margaret, who would be coming back to London soon from her summer holiday.

The Strenuous Life

Philosopher Bertrand Russell, 76, saved his life by fighting the icy sea off Trondheim when the Norwegian flying boat he was on crashed; 19 of the 45 passengers died. After swimming around until rescued, Russell said: "I don't suppose I was swimming for more than about a minute. For one who has been swimming regularly for about 70 years, it wasn't much."

Sweden's King Gustaf, 90, played host to 18 guests at his annual two-day shoot in the royal forest. On the go ten hours a day, the king shot four elk. Score for his guest of honor, Norway's 45-year-old

Crown Prince Olav: 1.

George Bernard Shaw, 92, entertained British Actress Frances Rowe. "I feel like a bouncing baby boy," cackled the playwright, and illustrated what he meant when a photographer tried to pose them together. His coaching to the actress: "Give me the glad eye, Fanny."

Winston Churchill was back in England after a vacation on the Riviera, where he had improved the lazy hours by finishing the second volume of his memoirs and painting eight canvases. There was also a striking photographic memento of the holiday (see cut) that showed Winnie rising, Neptune-like, from the Mediterranean marge.

Today's young woman considers herself a lot more sophisticated than her counterparts of the past, but she is no more proof against the "roguery and hypocrisy of seducers." So warned Pope Pius, who explained that the modern girl "believes herself able, with impunity, to read everything, to see everything, to try everything . . . She is disarmed before the peril."

The Amenities

Emperor Hirohito worried some about newsmen. As his first press conference approached, he asked a U.S. adviser whether it would be impolite to refuse to answer political questions. He was assured 'that it often happens, even in very politically advanced countries.

Newsmen worried some about Tallulah Bankheaid, though not as much as when she used to keep a pet lion cub that nipped interviewers' shins. Tallulah was back on Broadway to play in Noel Coward's old (1931) Private Lives. She received the press flanked by a Hungarian shepherd dog, a miniature Pekinese and an aquamarine parakeet named Gaylord.

St. Louis-born T. S. Eliot, now a British subject and Britain's most influential living poet, got a book for his 60th birthday. Specially published, it contained nosegays of one sort & another from 48 of Eliot's contemporaries in the arts. Sample posy from W. H. Auden:

When things began to happen to our favorite spot,

A key missing, a library bust defaced, Then on the tennis court one morning Outrageous, the bloody corpse and always

Day after day, the unheard-of drought, it was you

Who, not speechless with shock but finding the right

Language for thirst and fear, did most to Prevent a panic. It is the crime that

Counts, you will say. We know: but would gratefully add

Today as we wait for the law to take its course

(And which of us shall escape whipping?),

That your sixty years have not been wasted.

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