Word: dour
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Johnson subcommittee got a dour estimate of U.S. strength from its first witness. In four hours of testimony, shaggy-browed, often emotional Dr. Edward Teller (TIME, Nov. 18) ran off a grim morning line on U.S. chances in the race for survival. The University of California physicist estimated that Russia is closing the gap in nuclear weapons, is about equal to the U.S. in aircraft and radar development, is ahead in ballistic missiles. Said Teller: "I would not say that the Russians caught up with us because they stole our secrets. They caught up with us because they worked harder...
...Gordonstoun, Philip reveled in a rigorous routine that included' two icy showers each day, a long, bracing hike before breakfast, hours spent in the company of dour but expert Scots fishermen and boatbuilders. He became captain of the cricket and hockey teams, and "head boy" of the school in his final year. He was "often naughty, never nasty," pitched in at dirty jobs like anyone else (on one school cruise when everybody else was seasick, he did all the cooking and dishwashing). He early proved he could do most things with less effort than other boys, sometimes showed impatience...
Like most good generals the world over, dour, gong-shaped Marshal Sarit has always professed a profound dislike and disinterest in politics. Instead, he has been content to boss the army and to combine business with business by seeing that most of the army's requirements for supplies and equipment are met by commercial firms he owns or controls himself. The marshal's business astuteness pleases his followers but they have long been distressed by his political indifference, and have watched with more than a tinge of envy as General Phao and his 50,000-man police force...
...first state banquet in Helsinki, high-living Nikita Khrushchev limited himself to one Martini, and goateed Premier Bulganin clung firmly to a glass of orange juice, whirling his forefinger alongside his temple to indicate that stronger liquids made him dizzy. What little serious drinking took place was done by dour Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, who hopped about clinking glasses in an unpracticed attempt to work up a bit of gaiety. Perhaps he was still smarting under Bulganin's description of him to the Finns: "Quite a nice chap, but one of those fellows who will sit around all evening...
...week the General Assembly in Edinburgh elected Dr. George F. MacLeod its new moderator despite his known promerger leanings, vigorously shushed a delegate who opposed his election. But whatever sounds of ecumenical accord come this week from the General Assembly, in the background there will be the rumble of dour dissent from clergy and churchgoers. Rumbled the Scottish Daily Express: "The spirit of Knox is not dead...