Story of White 'Negro' Fascinated the World

    If I sound like a numb, it's because I am.

    I devoted a pair of articles last week to John Howard Griffin, a man with an engrossing story to tell.

    An author and  a native Texan, Griffin — with the aid of special medication — temporarily changed the color of his skin from white to black and traveled for six weeks in the South.  He lived as a Southern Negro. 

    And when he completed his masquerade he had some grim experiences to relate, and some stark conclusions about the lot of the Negro in the Deep South.  These I reported.

    I did it with a reporter's awareness that while I had a good story, a story worth telling, I was going to offend a lot of people who think "Negro" is a six-letter word.

    This I did.  But there was another reaction I wasn't prepared for. 

    The story wasn't 24 hours old before I got  a phone call from Paris.  Paris Match.  France's No. 1 magazine, wanted copies of the article.  An Associated Press story quoting the interview with Griffin had reached their hands and they were interested in reprinting it.