A woman in the throes of becoming a mother was being driven to General Hospital by a  neighbor one night recently and as they reached the Civic Center it became apparent they weren't going to make it.

    On a frantic impulse the neighbor swung into the parking lot of the City Health Building at 1st and Main Sts., and burst into the lobby seeking a doctor.  The building guards, James W. Payne and Aaron F. White, told him everyone was gone.

    Informed of the crisis, one guard phoned the Receiving Hospital and asked what to do.  A doctor there said he'd send an ambulance right away, meanwhile to keep the mother warm and clean.

     The ambulance arrived eight minutes later but not in time.  With the help of the two guards a lustily howling boy had been brought into the world and was wrapped in the final edition of The Mirror News, a matter which is herewith referred to the promotion department.

    RETURNING HERE recently by plane from San Francisco, Gene H. Costin, playing-card firm executive, noticed the "Fasten Seat Belts" sign was kept on all the way although it was a smooth flight.  Just before landing he asked the stewardess how come.
   
"Psychology," she replied.  "Up front we have 25 sorority girls from Berkley going to L.A. for the week end.  In back are 17 Coast Guard enlistees."  The wolf whistles at the unloading platform proved what she meant.

    QUIZZICAL REMARK
These wealthy TV quiz
    winners
I view with emotions
    mixed.
Not having been on,
    I'm well off.
While they, it appears,
    are well fixed.
    –RICHARD ARMOUR

   THE SAGA OF Evelyn Rudie reminded Peter Breck, TV Black Saddle man, of the thing that happened last Saturday when he performed in bull-whip and ax-handle duels with a stunt man at the Girl Scout Jubilee at the Sports Arena.

Afterward a tiny Brownie came up to him and asked, "Mr. Breck, can you tell me where they keep the lost Brownies?"  Meaning herself.

    NOT LONG AGO  I sent a query into the air — how did Mt. Disappointment get its name?  Now it has come back answered, by Jo Ann Metzenheim of Altadena.  She found the explanation in an article written by Frank J. Coleman in the book "Pasadena in the Gay Nineties," as follows:
    
“Hiking to Mt. Disappointment with Switzer one day, I asked him how the peak got its name.  He replied, 'I'll show you when we reach the top.'  On the summit, as other hikers will remember, was a cairn of loose stones.  From a covered can which he took from an opening on the side, he handed  me  a U.S. engineers report which read as follows, as I remember it: 'We approached this range from the west and thought that this peak was the highest in the range.  After an arduous climb, we found that it is not the highest.  Therefore, we hereby name it Mt. Disappointment.’ ”

    ONLY IN L.A. — A cleaning shop on Broadway near Manchester has the eye-catching sign.  "Will fur-line your Dodger cap for winter wear". . . When she sat down to lunch the other day, Ena Skvarla , deputy county clerk, was chagrined to discover she'd brought a bag of garbage.  In hurrying to work she'd put her lunch, packed in a similar bag, in the garbage pail and, you guessed it.

    AT RANDOM — A gal prevailed upon her long time boyfriend to help her move to a new apartment.  After an hour of hauling furniture and boxes, he said, "Honey, why don't we get married so I won't have to do this stuff?" What a dreamer . . . Recommended listening:  Errol Garner's version of "Misty," a fine tune, also done admirably by Johnny Mathis.  A few more like this and there'll be  a breakthrough to sanity in music, away from r&r . . . Following a discussion of the TV quiz show scandals, lawyer Frank Crowley, as an afterthought, gave his secretary, this memo: "However, it is not true that Van Cliburn uses a player piano."