"Dear old Sandringham," murmured King George V, "the place I love better than anywhere else in the world." Three generations of British royalty felt the same way about the vast, 350-room pile in the flat fields of Norfolk—never mind its drafty inefficiency. Then along came modern-minded Prince Philip, with inventories for the kitchen, time and motion studies for the help and a peck of new gadgets. Washstands were replaced by hot and cold running water, open fires with central heating. Now the work load is so low that six of Sandringham's eleven 56¢-per-hour chars have been given the sack. What did they think of that? "He wants to run Sandringham like a destroyer," muttered one old retainer.

Word came that Brobdingnagian Boozer Jackie Gleason, 49, would be dropping by to help open the Lutheran Church's Youth Conference in Miami Beach. Suddenly there were righteous snorts all over Convention Hall. "He is not the kind of person," harrumphed one delegate, to be associated with 8,000 impressionable young Lutherans. Nonsense, replied Theologian J. Benjamin Bedenbaugh: "Why, Jesus spent more time with the Jackie Gleasons of his day than with the professors of theological seminaries." About 300 delegates canceled out, but when the bibulous Great One finally appeared, the others gave him a standing ovation. "I had some qualms about coming here today," said Jackie. "I understand I am a reprobate."

George Reedy, 55, was cast as a big man around the White House when he was Lyndon Johnson's press secretary, and last week he came back in just about the biggest casts anyone ever saw. Recovering after a successful operation at Rochester, Minn.'s Methodist Hospital to correct a painful condition called "hammertoes" (in which the toes curl under the foot), Reedy clomped over for a chat with the boss, said he would be back puttering at odd jobs in the White House this week, consulting the President on labor matters and appointments. Asked how he felt with those plaster elephant legs, George answered with a press secretary's skill: "Just great."

Californian Donald C. Dawson, 25, emerged from the jungle north of Bien Hoa airbase and reported that his reckless, obsessive search for his brother, Army Lieut. Daniel Dawson, was over after nine months—four of them as a Viet Cong prisoner. "They told me he was dead and gave me a flight vest he wore, and then they told me to go," said Don sadly. He never saw the grave, but the Viet Cong claimed they would tend it until Dawson could come back after the war to recover the body of his brother, shot down last Nov. 6 in a light reconnaissance plane. For Don, it was time to go home to his wife and four children in Costa Mesa, Calif.