People: Aug. 30, 1968

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During last September's elections in South Viet Nam, Truong Dinh Dzu was a "peace candidate" for President, and he advocated a coalition government with the Communists. He came in second, after President Nguyen Van Thieu. Later he was arrested, charged with "actions which weakened the will of the people to fight against the Communists," and last month was sentenced to five years in prison. Last week Dzu's lovely daughter Monique Dinh Dzu, 22, a teaching aide at U.C.L.A., arrived in Chicago with an appeal for the Democratic Convention to condemn that ac tion. In a press conference at Senator Eugene McCarthy's headquarters, she presented a petition urging the Democrats to write a platform plank demanding her father's release. First signer: Senator McCarthy.

As soon as its plans were made public 31 years ago, the $6,750,000 Garden State Arts Center near New Bruns wick became the pride of New Jersey. Focal point of it all was a 5,000-seat outdoor amphitheater designed by Edward Durell .Stone, 66, and to everyone's embarrassment, the very first performance in the craterlike theater was nearly washed out when a spring storm caused a flood backstage. Last week the rains came again during a performance of the Jeffrey Ballet, and once more Stone's crater flooded as the drains apparently failed to handle the deluge. Water cascaded across the stage, splashed like a waterfall over the concrete wall that fronts the orchestra pit, then began to wash up the aisles into the amphitheater. Finally, the audience had to be sent home.

"What is Secretary of State Dean Rusk's idea of a vacation?" runs a current Washington gag. Answer: "He puts on a sports shirt and goes to the office." Only by exercising their ingenuity do any members of Lyndon Johnson's Cabinet beat the system to organize makeshift vacations for themselves. Transportation Secretary Alan Boyd forgets horsepower and highways by bicycling on towpaths along the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. HEW Secretary Wilbur Cohen cuts wood to "work up a good sweat and work off my hostilities," while Interior Secretary Stewart Udall makes it part of his job to explore his 28,051,328-acre domain in the National Parks System. Treasury Secretary Henry Fowler, who had a gall bladder operation earlier this month, is now recuperating at home, turning his convalescence "into a most enjoyable vacation."