PEOPLE

It is almost as certain as fog in London that Lady Attlee, 63, wife of Britain's former Laborite Prime Minister, will have a traffic accident every so often. Last week, for the ninth time in 13 years, her car was on the receiving end of a collision. As in the other crashes, Her Ladyship, an understandably cautious driver by now, was neither injured nor held at fault. Pondering the "bashed-in rear" of her little blue Fiat, Lady Attlee observed: "It was terribly unfortunate." More feelingly, Lord Attlee, her unscathed passenger, snapped: "Damned annoying!"

After Librarian Mary Knowles was convicted of contempt of Congress in 1957 for clamming up about her supposed Red ties before a Senate subcommittee, the Quaker-operated William Jeanes Memorial Library in Plymouth Meeting, Pa. not only ignored a community outcry for her scalp but also gave her a raise. The library got a $5,000 award from the Fund for the Republic. Last week the U.S. Court of Appeals overturned Librarian Knowles's conviction, thus spared her a four-month jail stretch and $500 fine.

Elected by the exclusive 40 of the French Academy to join their "immortal" numbers, poetic Director Rene Clair, 61, shocked his new fellows a trifle by proclaiming in his acceptance speech: "It's so much easier to be immortal while living than after death."

Tanned, relaxed and obviously happy after six honeymooning Caribbean weeks ("It would not surprise her family or friends," reported the Hearst Headline Service, "if she bore her first child before spring"), Britain's Princess Margaret and Antony Armstrong-Jones returned to

England, began settling down in Clarence House, the Queen Mother's London residence and the newlyweds' temporary abode until their red brick home at 10 Kensington Palace is ready for occupation next month. Some odd news awaited them: Tony's effigy had been swiped from Madame Tussaud's famed London wax museum. Said a Tussaud spokesman: "We are most upset."

When he was 40, Music Critic Carl Van Vechten was disposed to quit writing critical essays because at that age, he believed, his "intellectual arteries" had hardened. The affliction apparently did him no harm: after that he wrote seven novels about what made the Twenties roar (The Tattooed Countess, Nigger Heaven), twelve other books about music and himself, a definitive tome on cats (The Tiger in the House)--and all manner of critical essays, including some on photography, a durable interest in which versatile Van Vechten still excels. Still a chronic essayist, Van Vechten turned 80 last week and was honored by the New York Public Library as one of its chief benefactors, donor of many literary treasures that he has collected over the years. His name is the yoth to be carved in stone in New York City's main library.

Daughter of a great U.S. playwright, wife of a great U.S. movie comedian, Oona O'Neill Chaplin, 35, told Interviewer Frederick Sands about the 17 years that she has spent with Charlie, 71, as his fourth wife and mother of his seven chil dren. In the American Weekly, Oona, still lean, open-faced, and now becoming grey-streaked, a partner in Chaplin's Swiss exile since 1952, makes it clear that Charlie has never seemed like a father to her.

Both she and the kids regard him as "ageless." She says: "Laughter is one of Charlie's great gifts to me. I hadn't known it before. My childhood was not very happy. We met when I was 16, a mere child at the time, and I have been in love with him ever since. He is my world. He has made me more mature and I keep him young. I never consciously think of Charlie's age for 364 days of the year. Only his birthday is the annual shock to me--when the whole world seems to pour into our home with wishes, cables and presents." Motherhood is Oona's favorite occupation: "I am delighted every time I have another baby. The more the merrier is our family slogan. Charlie is just crazy about the kids. And he tells everyone that I look my prettiest when I am expecting a child." Oona discloses that the aging Chaplin is just as eccentric as ever: "Such a contradiction. I always have to carry a large supply of loose change when we go out--to do the tipping. And then he'll go off and buy me an expensive car!" Sometimes the little tramp of the old silent films is equally confusing to his children: "When Victoria saw her first Charlie Chaplin movie, she asked, 'Was that funny little man my grandfather?' "

The little tent of blue which prisoners call the sky drew closer for ex-Teamster Boss Dave Beck, 66, now tending his manifold private interests in Seattle. The State Supreme Court of Washington upheld his conviction for pocketing $1,900 from the sale of a used Cadillac that was owned by the trusting Teamsters.

Invited to attend an oldtime-auto col lectors' association meeting at Winthrop Rockefeller's Winrock Farm in Arkansas, ex-Opera Tenor James Melton accepted, wound up selling his whole shebang of oldtime Americana to the host. Melton's collection, one of the finest privately owned "autoramas" in existence, includes both antique and classic cars, an 1829 steam locomotive, an 1893 steam-driven stage coach, enough other bric-a-brac to extend its inventory to 30 pages. Estimated price on the lot: about $250,000. Rockefeller will house the collection in a special building to be erected at Winrock Farm, charge admission fees, which will go to his charitable Rockwin Foundation.

In "grateful celebration" of their 50th wedding anniversary, New York's Democratic ex-Governor and Senator, Herbert H. Lehman, 82, and his wife Edith gave a $500,000 present to the children of New York City. The money was accepted by the city for construction of a children's zoo that Lehman envisions in Central Park, just across the street from the Leh-mans' longtime place of worship, Temple Emanu-El.

Under local segregationist pressure, the Kiwanis Club of Greenville, S.C. canceled a speech, booked early last April, by North Carolina Integrationist Harry (For 2$ Plain) Golden, who took the wave-off more or less philosophically: "I was really surprised. Just a little speech. I wasn't going to be rude or disrespectful. I was merely going to talk about the South, the Jews, the race issues, the moral issues in integration."

Some 45 million Frenchmen got mildly shattering news from the tabloid Paris-Jour, which published a scoop that Cinemactress Brigitte Bardot will end her movie career within a year. "I've had enough of the life I'm leading," Paris-Jour had BB saying. "I'm 25 years old. In ten more years, adieu to youth. So I want to enjoy it a little and say adieu to the cinema and practice the profession I like best in the world." Breathless readers then learned that Brigitte's favorite profession is one of the world's oldest: selling antiques. Next day BB called a press conference, dismissed the Paris-Jour interview as "nonsense." Said she: "I can't even make a joke without everyone's making a big fuss over it. People should know that I won't stop making films until I'm an old woman."

Jordan's Crown Prince Mohammed, 20, madcap brother of worldly and fairly wise King Hussein, who is four years older tooled through the crowded streets of Amman with his aide in his car and bowled over a hapless pedestrian. A hostile mob converged on Mohammed's royal presence. Somebody in the car started shooting, killed at least one, winged several others. Mohammed, in a bad version of a Middle Eastern western, then fled to his brother's palace. Hussein, brought close to the ignition point by his brother's antics, rushed off to condole the bereaved families. The aide, blamed in official communiques for the lead-slinging, was in jail. Mohammed was back at the wheel of his bone-crushing car.

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