Massachusetts: Ex-Loser

They called him "the baby-faced assassin" at Harvard, where he was an All-America guard in 1941. Old grads claim they can still hear echoes of the thunderous tackle he made on Navy's William ("Barnacle Bill") Busik. As a lieutenant on the submarine Tirante during World War II, he won the Silver Star for leading raiding parties aboard Japanese craft and engaging in hand-to-hand combat. Yet for all such exploits—and despite his heritage as a member of one of Massachusetts' most celebrated Yankee families—Endicott ("Chub") Peabody, 42, until last week was a chronic political loser.

Chub's family tree is full of prominent Democrats. The most famous of all was Chub's grandfather, the Endicott Peabody who founded Groton and who was a lifelong advocate of Democratic public service.

Do-Good. But for all his credentials, Chub was beaten in a 1956 attempt to win the Democratic nomination for state attorney general. In the 1958 primary, he lost again for the same job. In 1960 Peabody (pronounced Peab'dy in Massachusetts) ran unsuccessfully in his party's gubernatorial primary.

This year, while Democrats were preoccupied by the Teddy-Eddie battle for the Senate nomination, Peabody won his party's endorsement for Governor. But he still looked like a loser against Republican Governor John A. Volpe, a former contractor who had balanced the budget and who, as an Italian Catholic, seemed likely to win many votes from Democratic voting blocs.

Peabody's do-good campaign alienated many Democratic professionals. But Volpe offended some voters by refusing to debate with Peabody, even though Peabody's ad-lib remarks frequently are confusing enough to prompt the crack: "He played football too long without a helmet."

Tough Task. Teddy's landslide victory apparently carried Peabody across by 3,868 votes—at least pending a possible recount of the cliffhanging contest. At one point he seemed about to fall backward—but the discovery of a "clerical error" in Democratic Holyoke gave him an additional 8,500 votes. It seemed likely, therefore, that Peabody would get a chance to practice what he long has preached: "I want to play my part in shaping the world, and I don't believe in hiring mercenaries to do it."

But many in Massachusetts still felt that Chub Peabody would find the shaping of the world a painful task when he collides with the cynical Democratic professionals in the Massachusetts legislature. Says one legislative veteran: "You're going to find him some cold night outside the Statler without his pants. The kindest thing you can do for him right now is give him a bathrobe."