Daily Press from Newport News, Virginia • Page 92

T9 Cameras And Action Second Nature To John Cameron Swayze DAILY PRESS, Newport News. Va Sunday, Sept. 16, W9 John Cameron Swayze. whose news sbow folded in 1956, is still torturing Timex watches and pitching their lastingness with the line: "It takes a licking but keeps on ticking." S' I By MARIAN CHRISTY The sophisticated scene, so praticed it suggests the band is almost quicker than the eye, seems snipped out of an old television movie. First the reel zeroes in for a close-up of John Cameron Swayze, now 73, the famous Camel Caravan nightly anchorman who, in his NBC-TV heyday, was known as The Mighty Newscaster despite his surprisingly small size.

Swayze is asked to pose for photographs. Cameras and action are second nature to hira. He smiles on cue and if there's a lag in the conversation he fills it with hilarious apropos quotes from the famous. The quotes are scribbled or typed on miniature cue cards stashed in the inside breast pocket of his impeccable, custom-made navy blue suit. SWAYZE SEEMS THOROUGHLY prepared for the camera.

There's not one gray hair showing. A fresh yellow boutonniere beams technicolor. But when Swayze hears the word, "photograph," he excuses himself to enjoy his drink, a straight-up vodka martini, presumably meant to be sipped slowly. But, in one perfectly rimed, Houdini-inspired flick of the wrist, the drink disappears in one expert gulp, the facial expression virtually unchanged. Before joining the photographer, Swayze tells a waiter hovering nearby that he'll have another.

His tones have the preciseness of long- -ago-learned elocution lessons that are second nature. After posing for photos with popcorn and children, the second martini is downed in a retake of the original scene. John Cameron Swayze, whose news show folded in 1956, is still torturing Timex watches and pitching their lastingness with the line: "It takes a licking but keeps on ticking." Ironically, the advertising agency rhyme seems strangely applicable to Swayze himself because, before this interview is over, he confesses openly, with only the faintest embarrassment, that when he retired from television newscasting: "I had One recurred with alarming regularity. "I COULDN'T SEEM to get to the studio on time. Late! I was going to be late! But, oh, I'd get there finally but I couldn't sort out the news -stories fast enough and, suddenly, somebody would say: 'You're This is the only moment in the interview that Swayze's expression is anything less than composed.

"It was horrible," he continues. "I woke up in a sweat." John Cameron Swayze hasn't written a television-oriented autobiography but he has created a paperback book, "The Art of Living." He realizes, very suddenly, that displaying this smidgeon of panic somehow pales the impact of the book. "I didn't go to a doctor or anything like that," he says. "I just said to myself: 'John, this is crazy and let's let it go at Then he defines the art of living in one swoop. "Just be yourself.

Don't change. Unless you're a bum. Then change." Swayze is an earthy Norman Vincent Peale, a positive thinker who made it big in the rival-ridden world of television. He is not merely another man of the pulpit who advises people how to survive in the real world, which somehow seems separate from the church. HE ADVISES YOU NOT to trust your neighbor, that trust is blind trust, that luck is great but don't count on it, that there's a big difference between a wise man and a wise guy.

He believes in hunches and insists you believe and are who you want to be. Only one thing scares him. Getting old. Swayze, you see, doesn't think he's old now because he plays golf (and still plays well) with an ex-General Motors executive who's in his 80s. "It's all right to slow down," he is saying.

"But what would 1 do if there was nothing to do?" Swayze, who bristles at the most minor lulls in conversation, blazes on about Jules Verne doing his best work in his 70s, about Pablo Casals giving concerts in his 90s. Then the cue card is pulled out of his breast pocket. "And Gen. MacArthur said: 'Youth is not a time of life. It's a state of KANSAS CITY-BORN Swayze, son of a wholesale drug salesamn, attended Kansas University but didn't graduate.

He dropped out to get a job on radio and he prides himself on both his clarity of voice and clarity of language. "There is no need to be hifalootin'," he says, purposely resorting to the vernacular. He is unable to contain a related joke. "And a romance-prone lady is saying to her frfend: 'I'm having an And the friend retorts: 'Really, who's Swayze, who can smile without crinkling bis eyes, adds: "Language is terribly important how else can you really communicate." Naturally Swayze watches bis old love, the television news, religiously. On Barbara Walters: "I've never met her.

But I don't care for Barbara Walters when she's doing straight news she isn't doing it any-' more. Which is a good thing." Swayze made $110,000 annually at the height of his career, Walters is making $1 million. "No one is worth that kind of money Later Swayze is asked to comment on Johnny Carson, who reportedly was offered $15 million by ABC-TV for a three-year contract. "Gooooood for Johnny!" exclaims Swayze who, for a split-second, has forgotten his comment about the much-smaller Barbara Walters' salary.) ON JESSICA SAVITCH: "She's working out real well." A Cheshire cat smile. "Besides, we're both from Kansas City." The Swayze image is a of mish-mash legends and no one tells them better than Swayze.

There's the blooper about introducing Dorothy Dix, woman columnist, as Dorothy Djx, "wooden Communist." There's the barbed 19W congratulatory telegram, now framed, from an irate viewer: "Thank you for your very bigoted opinion." And there are the stories that desk-hidden John Cameron Swayze delivered the nightly news sitting here in his boxer shorts. "Oh that;" he says playfully. "Wellllll," he counters slowly, "it was hot as hell in the studio. Those days the Klieg lights got you. So I wore old sailing pants that bad, er, seen better days.

People exaggerate! But," now Swayze is laughing and the next words come in a fast torrent, "I did look like hell from the waist down." Swayze is cashing in on his old television fame. Television has a certain indelibility. bernina everything you con drtam about in sewing mochine record SALES SERVICE exclusively of Once seen, always remembered. Swayze, a Timex spokesman who travels hither and yon making speeches and personal appearances, won't divulge his salary, reported to be in the low six figures. "WON'T YOU HAVE a piece of toast?" he asks in forced politeness, when queried.

He is adept at distraction. He can't tolerate the ensuing silence so it is filled with the sound of his voice. "I remember," he is saying hurriedly, "that I once worked with an excellent reporter who looked as if he slept in his clothes for days at a time. The network sent someone around real quick to straighten him out. Television is exhibition.

Looks count. You don't have to be beautiful but Swayze says Americans "buy with their eyes," not their heads, which is why a salvage man purchases damaged goods, "buffs them up" and makes money. "If you put rusty merchandise on shelves, nobody will buy." THEN, FINALLY a little golden nugget of information and insight. "I always wanted to be an actor. In fact, I went to acting school.

It's where I really learned how to present myself in the best possible light," he says resonantly, his eyes smiling at last. Young Bicyclist Seeks To Change Traffic Law 52 rooms without a bath! in a telephone interview. He bad just returned home after a day of gathering petition signatures in front of a local supermarket. He estimated he had gathered 175 names. Jeff also said that a lot of people didn't understand the current law and ride facing traffic anyway.

"Cops can just pick somebody up," he said. "There'll be a lot of people taken down to the police station for no reason." Jeff has a personal reason for want-ing the law changed, too. His mother took away his bicycle when bis family moved to Trumbull because she didn't think it was safe. Jeff said his older sister, Laurie, had been hit by a car while riding her bike several years ago. Jeff, a sixth-grader, is working at his project methodically.

He said he had studied state law at the town library and then got some petition forms from the town clerk's office. He also contacted state Rep. Morag Vance for her help. "I'd be happy to put a bill in for him," Mrs. Vance said.

"Why not give it a hearing? I think it has merit." She said she had told Jeff he didn't need the petition signatures, but he thought his idea might carry more weight in Hartford with some public support. By MARK SULLIVAN Associated Press Writer TRUMBULL, Conn. (AP) Jeff Smith is a man with a mission. He wants to convince the General Assembly that it should change what he views as a "dumb law." Jeff is 11 years old. He has been gathering petition signatures to persuade the lawmakers in Hartford to change the law that requires bicyclists to ride with the flow of traffic.

To Jeff it seems more logical to ride facing the oncoming traffic. "If you're riding facing traffic and see that a car is out of control, you can see it and get out of the way," Jeff said I 20lo OFF WAVERLY CUSTOM-MADE DRAPES a SPREADS Beginning on September 16th and through the month of September, Fabrics Unique offers Waverly Custom Draperies and Bedspreads at 20 off. There will never be a better time to buy fine custom drapes or bedspreads. Waverly seldom authorizes such a sale so take advantage of these low prices during September at Fabrics Unique. Also 20 off Roman and Austrian shades.

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