Evening star., 1949-12-18
New Senate Appointee
On Democrat Side
Won't Be Still.
By Wallace R. Deuel.

! next mOnLn, ana people mere WIN
know him are bracing themselves
for the impact.
He is William Benton. who has
just been appointed by Gov. Ches-
ter B. Bowles of Connecticut,
Benton's former partner in the
advertising business, to take over
the Senate seat which Raymond
E. Baldwin has given up in order
to become associate justice of the
Connecticut Supreme Court OF
Errors.
Benton is a political independ-
ent-as Bowles was, too, until he
ran for Governor on the Demo-
cratic ticket-but says he will "sit
on the Democratic side" Of the
Senate aisle.
This turn of phrase may mis-
lead the unwary. 1t will be aston
ishing if Senator Benton "sits"
anywhere for very long at time.
He has never sat down. stayed put
or stayed still for more than a
few brief consecutive moments in
his entire life. He is perpetual
motion in the flesh.
Perpetual Motion Benton
Now 40, Senator Benton is 5
feet 9 inches tall and weighs ITO
pounds-which he thinks is is
pounds too much. He has family
wavy brown hair, now receding at
the temples and graying. He has
the clean-c all-American.
youthful type of good looks which
characterize a good many sue
cessful, we'll fed, we'll dressed
business men in this country. An
unkind critic-and Benton has
many-says he looks like mid
dle-aged collar ad."
Senator Benton is, in fact. in
curably, consciously and delib-
erately youthful. no matter what
the unkind critic says-so youth
full that he intensely irritates citi-
zens whose vital juices do not flow
so freely.
At his best, Mr.. Benton has
a boyish charm which is almost
irresistible. His enemies, on the
other hand, call this same boyish-
ness the outward and visible sign
of a bad case of arrested develop
ment. In their more exasperated
moments, they talk about him as
though he were a juvenile delin-
quent.
Senator Benton has, In fact,
both some of the characteristic
strengths and some of the char
acteristic weaknesses of very young
men-an almost freakish feckless-
ness, enormous vitality, a fierce
individualistic independence, quick
enthusiasms. temper which
flares up and dies down with equal
facility. an impatience with forms
and formalities and an innocence
Of tact of positively planetary
proportions. He is one Of the
least inhibited of men.
When Benito Mussolini was
about to attack Ethiopia. an or
|ganization called World Peace
ways asked Mr.. Benton to sug-
gest ways of mobilizing world
opinions against the Duce. Mr..
Benton instantaneously produced
three. One was to send Henry
Ford to Europe on Peace
Ship" The second idea was to
have Col. Charles A. Lindbergh
make a round-the-world fight,
delivering a parchment scroll ap-
pealing for peace in every world
capital. But Mr.. Benton himself
particularly favored third pro-
posal he made-to have the Pope
make a pilgrimage. riding on a
donkey. from Rome to Geneva.
He still thinks the idea might
have worked.
Succeeds at Success
But If Senator Benton is youth
full in some ways, he also is more
mature than most men of his age,
or any other. in some of the things
that count most in the world.
Thus he focuses his tremendous
vitality and sustains his vast en-
thusiasms indefinitely as few men
can do these things. He has
usually known exactly what he
has wanted out of life, moreover,
and he has usually gotten it.
Above all Mr.. Benton has the
Midas touch. His business ven-
lures seem to succeed unfailingly
and in a measure that sometimes
seem to partake Of fantasy.
Senator Benton almost became
st. Louisan once. His mother
was headmistress of Hosmer Hall,
then a distinguished st. Louis
school for girls, while the young
Benton was an undergraduate at
Yale, and he spent his Christmas
holidays in the city. 1T was in
st. Louis that I first tasted cham
pagne," he now recalls. But Ben
ton wanted to make lot of
money and makes it fast. and New
York, he decided, was the place
for that.
He and Bowles formed their ad-
vertising partnership in 1929,
three months before the onset of
the great depression. Mr.. Benton
was then 20. Six years later the
firm was handling $15,000,000
worth of business year, Mr.
Benton was making $250,000-and
on his 35th birthday he retired" !"
Through fabulously successful
investments he has gone on max
ing money, during his so-called
retirement" with an almost mo-
notonous prodigality:
He invested $4,000 in shoe
factory owned by Yale class
mate and sold out his interest a
few years later for $185. 900. He
paid $3.50 900 for the Muzak COM
pany, which pipes recorded music
into restaurants and other public
places, and has since been offered