Evening star., 1939-05-29
Spelling Prize Won
By Girl, Z, From
Auburn, Mass. +
Humphrey Cook, Is,
Of Richmond, Va,
Is Second

1AAdOCtll tACC, q ucHluIc LLtlc
girl of IL from Auburn, Mass,
emerged today at the National
Museum auditorium with the $500
prize of the National Spelling Bee
after a grueling bout with poly
syllable nouns, adjectives with
strange endings and motley assort-
ment Of past participles.
Last year Elizabeth Rice got into
the finals from her region. A few
days before she was to start for
Washington her bicycle collided with
a street car. With a broken arm
in cast, she came on in q stretcher
and finished fourth. This year Moth
ing could stop her. She's in the
9Th grade.
In second place, with $500 as his
reward, was Humphrey Cook, 13, Of
Richmond. Va.
Humphrey was thrown by homo
geneity." Elyizabeth took up the
challenge, spelled the word cor
rectly and triumphed over the next
one, which happened to be "canoni-
CAL"
23 Finalists in Contest.
There were % finalists in the an
nual contest sponsored by news
papers IN 81 States. They all stood
up stanchly under such words as
"avoirdupois" and "dissession," but
later trickier words began to appear,
and one by one they fell out.
Mildred Kariher OF YOUNGSTOWN,
Ohio. placed third.
Third prize was worth 500.
Fourth place went to the Iowa
contestant, Dorothy Perkins, who
stayed In until she spelled petulant
with two e's. Those who finished
from 4th to 10th won $50 each,
those from 18th to 2lst $40.
Receives Two Trophies.
The shy little winner from Mas
sachusetts, who was sponsored by
the Worcester Telegram and Ga
zette, also received two trophies-the
Louisville Courier-Journal National
Spelling Bee Plaques. One of these
goes to her school. The other she'll
keep.
She got burst of acclaim when
she negotiated the last two words and
was proclaimed the champion.
There was frequent applause dur
ing the bee when some contestant
spelled particularly difficult word.
The judges usually consulted the
dictionary before making a final de-
cision. Even educators had been
fooled by the varagies of English.
William Wiegand, a tiny lad of 10
entered by the Detroit News. earned
frequent applause for reeling of
such words as iconoclast and bibliog-
raphy. He finished eighth.
The winner of third place, 14-year-
old Mildred Kariher, was cheered by
her fans when she got past "thesau-
rus" but a little later "farcical''
stumped her. She spelled it 'fosi-
cal"
Some Of the children insisted on
clear definitions of words they had
never heard Of, and then meditated
for minutes before making try.
Hard as the children tried, how
ever, they all took defeat good
naturedly and retired grinning.
Girls Predominate.
One of the smallest girls, Junie
Ratliff of Charles Town. w. Va, a
quaint figure in print dress and pig
tails, left the "e" out of attorney.
AS usual, girls predominated
among the finahsts There were
only four boys, but they acquitted
themselves well. One finished Sec
ond, another eighth. The others
dropped out early in the elimination.
When the diminutive William
Wiegand spelled "unsophisticated, -
after asking the pronouncer to re-
peat 1t twice, he received an ovation.
The word "settee" was too much
for Oliver Haeffner of Denver. His
version had one It,"
Also-rans, each receiving at least
$40 in prize money, included Nor
man Riley of Akron, Maureen Nc
Cluskey of Buffalo, Betty Saum of
Columbus, Ohio; Josephine Poln of
Hoboken, N. j.; Jane Mccall of
Knoxville, Hildegarde Wedding OF
Louisville, Juanita Routh of South
ern Indiana, Rosemary Haas of
Memphis, Betty Flood Of Miami,
Fla; Therese O'Brien of Passaic,
N. j.; Mary Virginia Logan of
Plainfield, N. j.; Carolyn Cooper of
Tulsa, Okla; Martha Gray of
Wheeling, w. Va, and jamie Saun-
ders of Winston Salem, N. C.
The director of the contest was
Douglas D. Cornette of the Courier
Journal. The pronouncers were
Harold F. Harding Of George
Washington University and George
F. Hussy jr., special contributing
editor of Webster's New Interna- a.
tional Dictionary. The judges were
John H. Lloyd Of the Interior De-
partment, Mrs. Wilford L. White,
formerly of the Harvard Graduate
School Of Business Administration
faculty, and Belmont Farley of the
National Education Association.