People: Fortunes of War

Old Reza Pahlavi, who abdicated as Iran’s Shah last month “for reasons of health,” was deposited by the British on the tiny island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean “owing to the war situation.” ∙∙ Henry Ford, who sent an ineffectual “peace ship” abroad last war, became the tenth citizen to sell or lease a yacht to the Navy for $1. (Two others: Vincent Astor, Major Edward Bowes.) ∙∙ Captain Lord Louis Mountbatfen (in command of the aircraft carrier Illustrious at Norfolk Navy Yard) declared in Washington that he had become a straphanger because cabs were beyond his means. ∙∙Debating food rations for men and women in the services, Lady Astor denied women ate less than men, told Parliament, “I eat far more than my husband.” ∙∙ Pursuing his dream of total comfort, elegance, and efficiency, Winston Churchill blossomed out in mirror-bright shoes equipped with zippers. His actress daughter Sarah, 27, joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force of the R.A.F. (another daughter, Mary, is already in the Auxiliary Territorial Service.) ∙∙World War I draft dodger Grover Cleveland Bergdoll, who has served a little more than a year of his seven-and-a-half-year term in Leavenworth, became eligible for parole when all remaining Federal indictments against him were dismissed by the Government, ∙∙ Hero Alvin York’s 28-year-old nephew of the same name joined the Army in Chattanooga. ∙∙ Carter Glass III, grandson of the Senator, joined the Army Air Corps and was assigned to ground communications. ∙∙ Peter Gerald Lehman, 24-year-old adopted son of New York’s Governor Herbert Lehman, enlisted in the R.C.A.F. in Ottawa. The U.S. Army Air Corps had turned him down as a husband and father. ∙∙ Gertrude Lawrence turned down a medal the Finnish Government offered her for Finnish Relief Fund work, because Finland “is now the vassal of Nazi Germany.” ∙∙Of wartime writing, Writer Somerset Maugham, 67, said: “I’ve reached the conviction that an author may do his country more good just by going on and writing as though there were no war.” ∙∙Of writers and Army life, Writer John Roberts Tunis, World War I veteran, declared: “There is nothing better for a writer. … If a writer is drafted, he’s lucky.” ∙∙ Hobo King Jeff Davis said the draft and defense industries had cleaned the rods of ‘bos.

After lingering nine days, haggard, platinum-blonde Raven Sherman, heroine of Terry and the Pirates, died of injuries in the Chinese mountains. At Chicago’s Loyola University some 200 students faced the east, stood with heads bowed in memoriam.