For Longtime Hostage, Holiday Hope Is in the Cards

The folks at home hope some holiday cheer will reach Terry Anderson, the Associated Press correspondent who is facing his fourth Christmas as a hostage in Lebanon. A campaign to send him Christmas greetings has attracted more than 7,000 cards from nearly every state and overseas, an organizer said. “We’re getting a fantastic response from schools,” said Jack LaVriha of Lorain, Ohio, who is directing the card campaign for the Free Terry Anderson Committee. Anderson is a native of Lorain. He has been a captive since March 16, 1985. The cards are to be delivered to Rep. Don J. Pease (D-Ohio), who plans to ship them to the State Department, according to his press secretary.

--She may be a civilian, but Uli Derickson displayed the kind of courage that gets the Pentagon’s attention. Derickson, the chief flight attendant who tried to protect U.S. sailors from Arab hijackers on TWA Flight 847 after it was hijacked June 14, 1985, will be given the Navy’s Distinguished Public Service Award today by Navy Secretary William L. Ball III. “Her courageous and heroic efforts to support and protect the passengers, including petty officers Robert Stethem and Clinton Suggs, were in keeping with the highest tradition of the U.S. Navy,” a Pentagon statement said. Muslim Shia gunmen commandeered the Athens-to-Rome flight and ordered the plane to Beirut, where Stethem and Suggs were beaten. Despite Derickson’s pleas, the hijackers killed Stethem. Her efforts on Suggs’ behalf succeeded.

--In keeping with the nature of the shuttle Atlantis’ mission, the crew was awakened with the theme from “Star Wars” and a revised version of the Beatles’ hit, “Do You Want to Know a Secret.” The parody, the brainchild of Houston radio writer-producer Mike Cahill, was beamed up from the Johnson Space Center in Houston, NASA said. Because Atlantis’ flight is a classified military mission, little information has been released to the public. That didn’t stop Cahill, who produced wakeup songs radioed to the crew of the shuttle Discovery, from making the lyrics known. The tune includes the lines: “Why we’re in orbit is a mystery” and “Nobody knows but the DOD (Department of Defense).”