The Experiment

About the first time any parent in Princess Anne, Md. heard about it was when one little boy returned home after an especially hard day in the seventh grade. "Mom," he announced, "I kissed eleven girls today." At first, the boy's mother paid little heed, but as her son began describing his exploits, she sat up and took notice. He had kissed eleven girls, said he, because his science class had been given over to a game of post office.

Within a matter of minutes, the mother was "having words" with the school principal. She soon found that hers was not the only complaint. Other parents, too, were wondering about that science class. What, they wanted to know, was Teacher Louis L. Pund trying to do?

Teacher Pund did not appear to be the sort who would go in for kissing games. A graduate of the Drexel Institute of Technology in Philadelphia, he was a mild-mannered man of 40, who claimed to have once been ordained a minister. Nevertheless, Fund obviously had his theories. "A lot of boys and girls," says he, "have inhibitions. I believed that post office would draw them out."

With that thought in mind, Fund began his experiment about a month ago, repeated it three different times. His class would elect a boy to retire to the cloakroom and there summon a girl to come out and be kissed. At first, Fund noted that his students were shy, but gradually, he was glad to see, they began to loosen up. At the end of a month, his experiment seemed, from his point of view, a success. It became, says Fund proudly, "a very noisy game."

Last week, as he packed his bags to leave town, ex-Teacher Fund admitted that he knew there would be repercussions ("Everybody who is a little different is considered an eccentric"). But the repercussions in Princess Anne did not bother him much. His real ambition in life, said he, was to get a job with a jazz orchestra -- playing the trumpet: "I hope never to have to teach again."

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