People, may 7, 1956

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Although Princeton University was rigged for trouble, the campus appearance of Alger Hiss, convicted perjurer and disbarred lawyer, in his first public speech since his release from the Lewisburg federal pen in 1954, turned out to be tame and dull. Protesters that morning had tried to warm Hiss's reception by decking the campus with some 100 papier-mâché pumpkins containing photographs of a Woodstock typewriter and microfilm, reminiscent of the pumpkin papers and other evidence that convicted him. Dawn also unveiled three signs protesting "Traitor" in foot-high red letters. But ex-State Department Employee Hiss, 51, appearing before about 200 students and 50 newsmen, spoke with dry pedantry on "The Meaning of Geneva," dulled his 25-minute discourse further with many a soporific quotation. His main, unoriginal point: the suicidal nature of modern nuclear warfare makes the success of summit talks more vital now than it used to be. So saying, Alger Hiss, whisked out a back door, vanished into the night.

West Germany's Supreme Court ruled that the nation's onetime spy boss, jittery Otto John, 47, whose confused East-West loyalties led him to use the Iron Curtain as a revolving door, must stay in prison and there await trial for treason.

During a cloak-and-dagger TV play in Britain, a solemn voice announced to televiewers: "Should you be threatened, ring the secret number Whitehall 5422, give the code number 1785, then the code word 'curtain raiser,' and you will be put straight through to the Prime Minister!" Delighted to hear such hush-hush information, hundreds rushed to their telephones to pass the time of day with Sir Anthony Eden, succeeded only in clogging the Cabinet Office's tie line to 10 Downing Street.

Word leaked out that German Munitions Magnate Alfred Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, barred from the U.S. as a convicted Nazi war criminal, nonetheless visited New York City last month. It was not his fault. Flying from London to the Bahamas for a vacation, Krupp was plunked down by surprise in the U.S. when his plane developed engine trouble. To ease its passengers' eight-hour delay, British Overseas Airways Corp. arranged a Manhattan sightseeing tour, dragged visaless Krupp along despite his spirited protests. After a gander at the United Nations headquarters, the Statue of Liberty, the TIME & LIFE Building and Wall Street, reluctant Sightseer Krupp winged on to the Bahamas.

From the Atomic Energy Commission to Hungarian-born Mathematician John Von Neumann, 52, pioneer developer of electronic brains and an AECommissioner, went a tax-free $50,000 for aiding the U.S. atomic energy program—second such award ever given (the first: to the late Nuclear Physicist Enrico Fermi in 1954).