Mr. Republican Jr.

In Washington's Mayflower Hotel one morning last week, tweedy David Sinton Ingalls lit up his pipe, grinned at the politicians gathered in his room and called the meeting to order. For twelve hours, the top men in Bob Taft's campaign sat in solemn conclave, point by point, then laid plans for Taft trips to the South, the Northwest and Texas, agreed on strategy for this month's meeting of the G.O.P. National Committee, and decided to enter their candidate in the Illinois primaries.

Taft himself was at the meeting for only two hours; the rest of the time, 52-year-old Dave Ingalls did the talking for him; the Taftmen well knew that he was eminently qualified for the job. A cousin* and long the closest friend of Mr. Republican, he is also Taft's personable junior partner, and the man in charge of his campaign. It was Ingalls who sparked Taft's Senate campaign in 1950; it was he who convinced Taft that he could win the presidential nomination in 1952.

Campaign Manager Ingalls has visited campaign headquarters only once. His job is with the candidate on the road, making friends and influencing delegates, writing detailed reports on what he sees and hears, oiling the wheels of the Taft bandwagon throughout the nation. Ingalls is Bob Taft's Jim Farley.

"It Just Happened." Scion of a well-to-do Cleveland family, Dave Ingalls was educated at St. Paul's and Yale, married Louise Harkness of the Standard Oil family. Dave Ingalls made the jump to politics at an early age. Armed with a Harvard law degree, a chestful of decorations as the Navy's only World War I ace (four sure kills), he was elected to the Ohio legislature at 27, won a second term on a barnstorming campaign in his own plane. With the sponsorship of an old aviator friend who knew his way around the Hoover Administration, ex-Ace Ingalls was made Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Aeronautics in 1929, just six weeks after his 30th birthday.

Ingalls took a fling at the Ohio governorship in 1932 (he lost), worked his way up in Ohio GOPolitics to state chairman and national committeeman. In 1940 he slaved to get Cousin Bob Taft nominated for the presidency (says he of Taft's defeat by Willkie: "It just happened").

"Good Shape." Two years ago, when Bob Taft went after re-election in Ohio, Ingalls, in his twin-engined Beechcraft, personally piloted Taft on many of his 334 visits to industrial plants, 873 speeches, 164 G.O.P. meetings, 143 receptions throughout the state. Ingalls sold Taft on speaking to college students wherever possible (on the tried & true theory that kids pass on their enthusiasm to grownups), mingled with the audiences, picked the brains of everyone he met, from local committeemen to escorting cops. Together with Campaign Treasurer Ben Tate (who holds the same post in the current campaign), Ingalls decided that Taft should aim at the presidency, if he won the Senate race by 250,000 votes or more. Taft's margin: 431,000. Last March Ingalls took off in his plane on an eight-month, 48-state political survey, came back with a pocketful of assurances that Taft was the man for 1952. He worked best at small lunches or dinners--"not less than 15 present," he explained, "and not more than 25." He added: "Everywhere I stopped, I always had at least one friend who would get me started."

Thanks to Dave Ingalls and his professional friends, Taft's campaign is now rolling in 48 states. What of its chances against Eisenhower? Last week Bob Taft boasted that if all his pledges were turned into convention votes, he would have a majority on the first ballot. Said Dave Ingalls: "We're in good shape. Gosh, we're in wonderful shape."

* Ingalls' mother is the daughter of Charles P. Taft, Bob's uncle.

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