The citation called her "an inspirational example of the Judeo-Christian concept of the family unit as the heart of the divine plan for the good society," and energetic Ethel Skakel Kennedy, 33, mother of seven majoring in home economics, was delighted to receive her first honorary degree as Doctor of Humane Letters at the Benedictine St. Bernard College in Cullman, Ala. Done up in black gown and mortarboard, the Attorney General's wife then told 4,000 guests about the recent White House dinner for Nobel laureates. Everything was going along smoothly, recalled Ethel, until she overheard Chemist Linus Pauling saying: "Great minds are like movie actors or sports figures--they gather together like a clan. I recognize all but two people here." Said Ethel: "I spent the rest of the night looking for the other one."

To restore Williamsburg, Va., to the red brick and clapboard authenticity of the 18th century, the late John D. Rockefeller Jr. laid out $70 million, but even that was not enough to finish the job. Now the philanthropist's family is dipping into the bank to help one of his pet projects. In the next five years, said Winthrop Rockefeller, chairman of the board of Colonial Williamsburg, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund will ante up $2,000,000 to finance the restoration of such buildings as the John Custis house, the Blair-Prentis general store, and early America's first theater, right down to the 18th century stage and props.

Restless drifters between the gilded mansions of Palm Beach and the palm-fringed villas of the French Riviera for a quarter of a century, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor arranged to spend their silver wedding anniversary with what the New York Times termed "symbolic appropriateness''--at sea. After a farewell whirl of champagne-and-caviar parties tossed by Manhattan's ever-doting socialites, Edward, 67, and Wallis, 65, boarded the liner United States for a trip to Europe and a quiet, high-seas celebration in perfect counterpoint to the carnival atmosphere surrounding their 1937 wedding at the Chateau de Cande near Tours, France.

Celebrating the ninth anniversary of her coronation and her "official" birthday (the real one was April 21, when she turned 36), Queen Elizabeth issued her traditional birthday honors lists and slyly mixed into it a heady summer highball. Named a Commander of the British Empire was A.R.D. Gilbey, maker of Gilbey's gin; named a member of the Order of the British Empire was Commander Walter Edward Whitehead, bearded pitchman for Schweppes quinine water. Among 2,000 other honors: a knighthood for Guardian Cartoonist David Low--who now becomes Sir David--creator of that enduring symbol of bumbling bureaucracy, Colonel Blimp; an Order of the British Empire for New Zealand Runner Peter Snell, world record holder in the mile, half-mile, 1,000-yd. and 500-meter races; Commanders of the Order of the British Empire for Novelist Elspeth Huxley, Poet Stephen Spender, Actor Emlyn Williams.

Splashed over three columns of the staid New York Law Journal was an account of how the feathers flew when gravel-voiced Comic Bert Lahr, 66, went to court over a duck who swiped his style. Back in 1961, Lahr slapped a $500,000 suit on the Adell Chemical Co., Inc. and a producer of TV commercials, for featuring a duck that sounded as if it had Lahryngitis. The actor speaking for the duck, quacked Lahr's lawyer, not only "misappropriated" Lahr's distinctive delivery, but also injured his reputation by giving the impression "that he was reduced to giving anonymous television commercials." A Boston federal court tossed out the case, but the U.S. Court of Appeals in Boston sent it right back "for further proceedings''--most likely a trial by jury.

With a $30 million sigh of relief, 20th Century-Fox finally brought Elizabeth Taylor and a real live six-inch Egyptian asp within striking distance of one another for the death scene in Cleopatra. "The asp," said Fox flacks somewhat ambiguously, "has been in training for two months."

With an oversized key to the city on the seat beside him, Hometown Boy Duke Ellington, 63, cruised in an air-conditioned black limousine down Washington's Pennsylvania Avenue, right on past No. 1600 where his father and uncle once were White House butlers. Before him strutted the ten-piece Eureka Brass Band from New Orleans, whanging out a version of When the Saints Go Marching In that was loud enough to halt Press Secretary Pierre Salinger in the middle of a briefing. The occasion was the First International Jazz Festival, a People-to-People program with the Duke serving as honorary host, that kept capital auditoriums rocking for four concert-filled days. The only thing that troubled Ellington, a jazz composer and performer for 40 years, was the use of the word jazz to describe all that blast. Said he: "'American music is a much more fitting term."

First he found his name listed on the program of a forthcoming Edinburgh writers' conference, then he got a letter saying that he was expected to appear. From his retreat at Montreux on the shores of Lake Geneva, Novelist Vladimir Nabokov, 63, sent his answer in the form of a letter to the London Times. "In the same list," said the strongly antileftist Russian emigre who left his homeland in 1919, "I find several writers whom I respect but also some others--such as Ilya Ehrenburg, Bertrand Russell and J.P. Sartre--with whom I would not consent to participate in any festival or conference whatsoever." Besides, said he, "I do not believe in abstract discussions on the novel."

As the bulls and bears grappled on Wall Street, the New York Stock Exchange added a reassuring name to its board of governors--Dr. Milton Stover Eisenhower, 62. Ike's younger brother, president of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, was named by Big Board President Keith Funston as the "prominent educator" that the 33-man board traditionally includes among its three public members. Past president of two other universities--Kansas State and Penn State--and veteran of a number of Government posts, including a special ambassadorship to Latin America, Milton Eisenhower also can claim financial accomplishments of his own. When he took over Johns Hopkins six years ago, the university's $67 million annual budget was well in the red. It soon moved into the black, has stayed there ever since.

During a lunch break on the Hollywood set of Critics' Choice, Leading Man Bob Hope headed into a banquet room and wound up with a surprise party. For his 59th birthday, co-workers gave him a $40 stuffed panda, a cake ablaze with candles, and a good-humored ribbing written by his own gagmen and delivered by Co-Star Lucille Ball. "I don't know just how old Bob is," said the sprightly redhead, "but he's closer to medicare than most Republicans." Added Lucy, recalling Hope's salad days: "He was handsome then--big chest, hard stomach. Of course, that's all behind him now." . . . Stage realism is all very well, but Actor Hugh Griffith, 50, a 1960 Oscar winner for his comic role as the chariot-racing Sheik Ilderim in Ben-Hur, laid it on a mite thick. Standing atop a wooden box in London's Aldwych Theater for a mock hanging scene in Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Griffith slipped, felt the noose tighten round his neck, and blacked out gurgling. First came the smelling salts, then the brandy. Ten minutes later the beetle-browed Welshman was back--and with a hangdog look, remounted the box to go on with the show. "I had forebodings about the scene ever since we started rehearsals." said he. "That box was a bit rickety."

As if by reflex action, an Atlantic City convention of the 447,000-member International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union unanimously elected diminutive David Dubinsky, 70, to his eleventh three-year term as president. Having brought the union from threadbare poverty (32,000 members, a $1,500,000 debt just before he became president) to silken opulence (assets of $425 million) in 30 years, the pudgy potentate of the cloak-and-suiters saw no reason why he shouldn't keep going. "Some people are old in their young days; some people are young in their old days," said he. "I feel that I can yet give service."

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