People and Events

The people of Whittier did a lot for the people of Friedburg, Germany, after World War II.

Children of the Quaker-founded Southern California town collected pennies and nickels and their parents sent food, tools and school supplies. Representatives of the Quaker community went to Friedburg to help rebuild.

So Whittier City Manager Tom Mauk said he was pleased--but not really surprised--when he received a check from Friedburg Friday. Citizens of the German city had contributed $50,000 to a relief fund for those displaced by last week’s earthquake. As a gesture of continuing friendship.

From a town with a long memory.

As if the ACLU didn’t have enough to worry about. . . .

A commercial laboratory in Santa Monica announced a process for conducting individual drug testing through analysis of hair.

“Drugs enter the hair from the bloodstream,” said Werner Baumgartner of Psychemedics Corp., “and remain there in proportion to the amount taken, not diminishing over time. Thus the test cannot be evaded, and past patterns of use can be established.”

He said the process, called radioimmunoassay of hair, is not only capable of revealing when drugs were taken--and whether in small, medium or large amounts--but is also able to establish that drugs were not used during a particular period of time.

And in contrast to the hassles that sometimes surround urine and/or blood testing, Baumgartner pointed out that obtaining a few sample hair clippings usually presents no problem at all.

(If you can’t trust you barber, just whom can you trust?)

One survivor knows another: Supervisor Kenneth Hahn smiled broadly when Museum of Natural History trustee E. N. Harrison presented him the skull of a saber-toothed tiger just before the start of a fund-raising dinner at the Century Plaza commemorating Hahn’s 40th year in elective office. It was, Hahn said, the very image he’d always cherished of himself.

“I want my political enemies to see this,” he said. “And be warned!”

A few minutes later, he launched his campaign for reelection.

First it was special telephone call-in numbers for surf reports. Then call-ins for games and computer bulletin boards. Then dial-a-porn and dial-a-prayer. And now the Spiritualist Center of Los Angeles is offering its own phone-in spirit-healing line.

For animals.

“It’s important,” Spiritualist healer Saul Weiss said, “to remember that our animal friends feel pain and become ill just as we do. It’s equally important to remember that they too can be healed.”

Weiss and Spiritualist Center founder Lee Jones said the spirit-healing process for animals begins as soon as the creature’s owner dials the number. Whoever answers will try to help.

“But of course,” Weiss said, “the caller might want a private healing for $5, or even long-term healing (prayers twice a day for a month) for $50. That’s affordable.”

And of course, Weiss said, “the money isn’t really important. No one is ever turned away for lack of ability to pay.

“After all . . . we’re a church.”

The legend that deer know where they are safe--and where they are not--got a little boost this week from trapshooters at the Oaktree Gun Club in Newhall, which is in an area where deer hunting is prohibited. Everyone repeatedly had to stop firing when a herd of deer wandered absent-mindedly across the range in groups of two or three, pausing from time to time to favor the frustrated sportsmen with an insouciant stare.

“Either very dumb deer,” said club manager Jack Quinn, “or very, very smart. . . .”