Girl’s Work Adds Up for Scientists

While many teen-agers are juggling the complexities of basic algebra and Saturday night dates, a 17-year-old British girl is being wooed by Harvard and several other universities to lecture and conduct mathematical research on such subjects as quantum groups and statistical mechanics. Ruth J. Lawrence, of Oxford, England, got her degree from Oxford University at age 13, is working on her doctorate and has caught the attention of the world’s top mathematicians. Her work has taken her to the outer fringes of theoretical physics and mathematics, such subjects as knot and string theory and the connections between the world of particle physics and mathematics. Ruth’s father, Harry, a computer consultant, gave his daughter her entire pre-Oxford education at home. Of her tender years, Ruth says: “The age thing really does not matter for more than the first two seconds . . . . I talk to mathematicians as mathematicians, and I think they talk to me in the same way.”

--Former White House spokesman Malcolm Kilduff, who became a footnote in history when he announced the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, has resigned as a weekly newspaper editor and says he plans to write a book. Kilduff, 60, had worked as editor of the Beattyville, Ky., Enterprise for 7 1/2 years. He was an assistant White House press secretary and was serving as acting press secretary for the first time on a presidential trip when Kennedy went on a political fence-mending tour of Texas in November, 1963. After shots rang out in Dallas, Kilduff appeared at a hastily arranged hospital press conference to tell the world that the President was dead.

--At 2 weeks old, Christopher Bollig may be a tad young to appreciate his special place in history. He is the seventh link in a living chain of generations anchored by the eldest of Wisconsin elders. He has five living grandmothers, from his mother’s mother, Debra Bollig, 33, of Janesville, Wis., to his great-great-great-great-grandmother Augusta Pagel, 109, who has been declared Wisconsin’s oldest citizen by Gov. Tommy G. Thompson. Christopher’s other grandmothers are Ella Sabin, 89, of Monroe, Wis.; Anna Wendlandt, 70, of Brodhead, Wis., and Betty Wolter, 52, of Orfordville, Wis. Debra Bollig, whose 15-year-old unmarried daughter Lori is Christopher’s mother, conceded: “We didn’t plan on having a seventh generation this soon.” Nevertheless, the family has written to the Guinness Book of World Records to see if it can claim the world’s record for seven living generations.