Religion: Stritch's Successor

Pope Pius last week named the successor to the late Cardinal Stritch as Archbishop of Chicago—largest Roman Catholic archdiocese in the U.S. (1,942,000 Catholics). He is Albert Gregory Meyer, for five years Archbishop of Milwaukee. (New York's and TV's Bishop Fulton Sheen was rumored to have been in the running.)

Tall (6 ft. 1 in.) Archbishop Meyer 55, was in Baltimore for a consecration* when the Vatican made its announcement, probably was glad to be out of town for the Milwaukee fuss and feathers that attended the news. No lover of the limelight, he is a scholarly, quiet man who smokes an occasional pipe, takes an occasional fishing trip (he calls fishing the "apostolic recreation") and puts in an occasional appearance at County Stadium to watch the Milwaukee Braves.

As third son of a Milwaukee grocer of German descent, he showed an early leaning to the priesthood (his sister, a nun, remembers that at the age of five he used to play at saying Mass with a cloth over an old table and a glass of water for the chalice of wine). In his early parish at Waukesha, Wis., and later as bishop of Superior, Wis., Meyer was more noted as an able administrator than as a fighter for causes, has rarely committed himself on social issues.