You Gotta Have Smarts J. O. Robinson...

You Gotta Have Smarts J. O. Robinson of South Pasadena read “with some consternation” our item on the “Cities With a Heart” survey. The project ranked L.A. as the third-stingiest city of 36 studied, based on research by some Cal State Fresno students who had portrayed pedestrians in need of help.

The question that this survey really posed, Robinson contends, is: “How gullible are the fine upstanding citizens?”

The researchers performed such experiments as dropping a load of magazines while wearing a phony leg brace, asking for change for a quarter and dropping a pen while walking. Another factor in the survey was the average amount of United Way contributions per resident.

Pshaw, Robinson says.

“I see at least one [leg-brace scam] every day on the way to work,” he points out. The change-for-a-quarter request, he theorizes, was probably misinterpreted as “spare a quarter?” And, he notes, United Way has had its credibility problems. The former top executive of the charity was convicted earlier this year on charges that he lived lavishly and romanced women with the aid of thousands of dollars of the agency’s money.

The real lesson in this study, Robinson concludes, is “one of the oldest rules of street smart: Don’t try to kid a kidder. . . .”

Nice going, L.A.

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List of the Day: While ambling through the Petersen Automotive Museum on Wilshire Boulevard, you can find numerous L.A. firsts. Some examples:

* Hattem’s, which opened at 43rd Street and Western Avenue in 1927, was a store that leased out space to several tenants, including grocers, butchers and bakers. It claimed to be the first to use the word “supermarket.”

* The first drive-in theater in California (and the second in the nation) opened at the corner of Pico and Westwood boulevards in 1934, with directions that said: “Sit in your car. See and hear talking pictures on the world’s largest screen.”

* The first bank designed as a drive-in was Security First National in Vernon in 1937. A remodeled warehouse, it had a revolutionary feature, a teller window in the driveway.

* The nation’s first self-service gas station sprouted in Whittier after World War II. It was called a “Gas-a-Teria.”

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Baseball on probation: We journeyed out to Chavez Ravine Friday night, figuring a Dodgers-Mets game would be sold out. Instead, the stadium was barely half full. Obviously, fan discontent has not faded. In fact, we saw several youngsters who flaunted their disrespect by reversing their caps--so the bills faced forward.

miscelLAny Among the classes offered at the Culver City Adult School this summer is “Baby-Sitting: Special Training for Teen-Agers.” Will the classroom have a refrigerator stocked with leftover pizza?