Rule #1: Always Remember Where Your Jet Crashed

A vanished Air Force warplane with its young pilot is a mirror image of an incident 40 years ago, when another military jet and pilot disappeared amid rumors of defection and treason.

In 1957, the nation wondered what had become of Lt. David Steeves and his T-33 training jet; both vanished on a flight out of the Bay Area. But unlike the present-day hunt that located the A-10 Thunderbolt this week, it was the T-33 pilot who turned up first. The jet would be lost for 20 years, sullying Steeves’ name to his grave.

Steeves had already been declared dead when he walked out of the Sierra Nevada after 54 days. He said he had parachuted out after “something blew up” in the cockpit. Eventually he found food in a park ranger’s cabin, and walked out of the mountains.

But his hero’s welcome evaporated. Steeves’ jet was still missing, and in the Cold War ‘50s, the rumors began: He had sold it to the Commies, he had faked the whole thing.

His wife left him. His colleagues turned their backs. The Air Force found no reason to charge him, but Steeves left the military; his career there was over.

For years after, in rented planes, he scoured the slopes of the Sierra for his lost jet. He died in 1965, the suspicions still unslaked.

Twelve years later, Boy Scouts hiking through Kings Canyon National Park found a cockpit cover. Its serial number showed it to be a remnant of David Steeves’ T-33.

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Nursing Home Violations

Nursing homes in these 10 counties received the most citations in 1996 from the state Department of Health Services. Because of lengthy appeals and state official’s discretion over fines, many fines are not collected for years or are never collected at all. Here are 1996 fines assessed compared to fines collected as of Feb. 22, 1997:

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NO.OF NO.OF AMOUNT AMOUNT RANK COUNTY N.HOMES CITATIONS FINED COLLECTED 1. Los Angeles 440 208 $353,100 $37,200 2. San Diego 74 101 $212,875 $53,650 3. Santa Clara 64 50 $238,450 $170,100 4. Orange 87 37 $137,000 $0 5. San Mateo 31 34 $37,100 $2,850 6. Sonoma 27 33 $91,150 $26,400 7. Ventura 22 22 $163,800 $30,350 8. San Bernardino 57 21 $105,400 $10,500 9. Solano 13 21 $59,200 $6,400 10. Napa 12 21 $38,900 $5,450

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Source: California Advocates For Nursing Home Reform, San Francisco

Researched by TRACY THOMAS / Los Angeles Times

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Gray matter: California has earthquake zones and fire zones, but there’s a saying that the most perilous place to be in the Golden State is between lieutenant governor Gray Davis and a TV camera.

As president of the state Senate, Davis makes extremely rare appearances in that chamber, like last year’s to cast a tiebreaking vote. But the Democrat, who would like to cap his Sacramento career with the governorship, dropped in on the Senate last week, the same day the PBS program “Frontline” was taping.

Davis walked to the Senate podium, and stood there for a time with nothing to do, before whispering to the presiding officer of the moment, El Monte Democratic Hilda Solis. She handed Davis the gavel and left. After a few minutes, so did he.

A week earlier, at the funeral of former L.A. teachers union leader Helen Bernstein at Hillside Memorial Park--the last resting place for Al Jolson, among others--Davis arrived 20 minutes late.

For once, TV cameras were at a respectful distance from the mourners. Davis’ driver pulled up near the bank of cameras. Davis got out and stepped up to the cameras to say his piece, then walked across the road and into the funeral.

And it isn’t even an election year. As Jolson said, “You ain’t heard nothing yet.”

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It’s only an advisory vote, but Humboldt State University should learn by Monday whether students want to ax “the Jack,” the school’s venerable lumberjack mascot, in favor of the endangered marbled murrelet, a swift-flying seabird that nests in old-growth redwoods. (Four years ago, the Jack bested another contender, Bigfoot, a creature almost as hard to find as the murrelet.)

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A girl and her dog: Multimillionaire Democrat Al Checchi told reporters that he would like to get his family’s blessing before he decides to run for governor.

His 20-year-old son, away at college, says yes. His 17-year-old daughter worries that the political meat grinder could chew up Dad.

But the real politician in the family has to be 12-year-old Kate, who cannily informed her father that “if she had a dog, she might be able to get through this.” And with spinmeister sagacity beyond her years, she added, “You know, Dad, all politicians have dogs.”

This can mean only one thing: impeach Socks.

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One-offs: The Associated Press reported with inadvertent bleak humor that San Joaquin County drug overdose deaths shot up 23.6% last year. . . . After a police chase that reached triple-digit speeds, two Manteca teenagers were booked for investigation of carjacking a van with a squirt gun. . . . A Rancho Cucamonga hamburger stand owner is leading the neighborhood fight against a zoning change that would allow a mortuary-crematorium to open next door. . . . Asked about his plans now that term limits have been struck down, Assemblyman Brett Granlund (R-Yucaipa), told a reporter, “You guys always write that I’m a smoker. I don’t make long-term plans.”

EXIT LINE

“He said if he wanted to fool around, he wouldn’t go for an old-bag, mother of three.”

--Robin Boyd, former intern to then-state Sen. Mickey Conroy, testifying in her sexual harassment lawsuit against Conroy, his former chief of staff and the Assembly Rules Committee. At the time that Boyd said she complained to Conroy about the touching and sexual jokes in the office, and he responded with that comment, she was 33. Conroy was 65.