People: Just Deserts

Field Marshal Sir Bernard Law Montgomery carried a pair of worn boots into Hoby's Bootshop in London's West End on Friday, asked for repairs by "next Tuesday . . . I'll be needing them in Germany." Hoby's—recalling that Wellington wore his Hoby boots at Waterloo, that Nelson died in his at Trafalgar—broke its two-to-three-weeks-for-repairs rule, promised delivery.

Arleen Whelan, 28, flame-haired, green-eyed stage & screen starlet and ex-manicurist, got undivided attention from a committee of 65 illustrators, who awarded her a wellrounded, unequivocal title: "the most perfect all-over beauty of all time." Runner-up: the Venus de Milo.

Joseph E. Davies, rich, Russia-fond ex-U.S. Ambassador (Mission to Moscow), was awarded the Order of Lenin for his "successful activities in strengthening Soviet-American relations. . . ."

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, whose likeness will appear on bonds for the eighth war-loan drive, will also join three other U.S. Presidents commemorated in the nation's small change: the Roosevelt portrait on all new dimes will keep company with Washington (quarters), Jefferson (nickels), Lincoln (pennies).

Viacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov, Russia's sharp-eyed, correct Commissar for Foreign Affairs, was rated the top "glamor boy" of the San Francisco conference by Britain's pert Delegate Ellen Wilkinson, Labor M.P. Her one qualification: Molotov (unlike Britain's Eden and America's Stettinius) was not really very glamorous "to look at."

Robert E. Hannegan, who made the grade from Missouri machine politician to Democratic National Chairman to U.S. Postmaster General, assured 200 Democratic Congressmen of his generous nature: "I believe that Republicans are entitled to all the good things in life—except jobs in public office."

Fun & Games

Lieut. General William Hood Simpson, immaculate, billiard-bald Ninth Army commander, was the most rumpled guest at a victory-celebration banquet in Germany: Soviet officers honored him with a triple toss ceilingward, the stouthearted Russian version of "three cheers."

The Gaekwar of Baroda, 36, plump, pleasure-bent potentate who rules 3,000,000 Indians, stirred up a tempest in Bombay teapots when he got top air priority to fly to England with his aide-de-camp for "health reasons." Scores of long-service British officers, waiting wearily for passage, on the crowded homeward bound planes, knew that the Gaekwar was going to England to race his stable, that his "aide-de-camp" was his champion jockey.

Pope Pius XII, in good health and high spirits, told 5,000 Italian sportsmen that sport based on fair play "elevates the spirit above small-mindedness, dishonesty and trickery" . . . develops a Christian domination of the human body—which the Church regards as "a masterpiece of God ... a temple of the Holy Spirit."

Jascha Herfetz, one of the world's great violin virtuosos, came off second-best at General Omar N. Bradley's little entertainment in Germany for a group of visiting Soviet generals. After Heifetz and Cinemactor Mickey Rooney had drawn polite applause, three unidentified G.I.s and three WACs went into a groovey jitterbug routine that sent the delighted Russians right out of this world.