CHILDREN: Pioneers

Forty-five small, pink-cheeked tykes, ages two to seven, met at Manhattan's West 42nd Street Ferry. They were going to camp. Their school doctor thumped their chests, made them poke out their tongues and say "Ahh," but they were all very healthy. Not one of them had got the mumps which had kept a couple of their playmates home in bed. Aboard a ferry they chugged peacefully across the river, listening to tug whistles, playing with miniature fish poles, sand pails and shovels, cowboy hats, a live cat and a 2-ft, pink-haired doll named "Betsey."

At Weehawken, NJ. they boarded a train for a Sullivan County camp. There they will spend six weeks in the U.S.'s first trial child evacuation of the war.