Word: spate
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...RICH WYOMING & NEVADA FOR ONLY $100. For months, a spate of such ads, by numerous outfits like "Petrol Services," have moved thousands to shell out $100 or more to lease oil rights on Government lands. They hope to sell out at a fat profit if oil is struck near their holdings...
Along about 1940, North Carolina's Robert Lee ("Muley") Doughton, Congress' oldest member, inaugurated a biennial ritual that Washington hands learned to take as a sign of spring. First comes a spate of rumors that Muley will not run again. Then comes a statement to the press: in response to his friends' demands, he will run after all. The ceremony came off right on schedule a fortnight ago; it was almost time to look for the first forsythia. Then, last week, Muley sadly broke the tradition. He announced that his doctors had ordered him not to risk...
...landed in Key West at noon in disappointingly chilly weather. He was understandably hard put to muster a quip when the White House correspondents (who had flown down just ahead of the Independence) met him dressed up in Confederate caps and handlebar mustaches, making painful fun of his recent spate of grandmother stories. He rushed through the handshaking ceremonies with Navy and civilian brass, then disappeared gratefully behind the "Sorry, No Visitors" sign at the naval base. Right after lunch, he turned in for a nap, slept all afternoon...
Then came the fireworks. The gunbearer shot off a spate of ping-pong balls into the ballroom. Whoever caught one of the three white ping-pong balls were to receive a prize. Two men and a woman stepped up to the platform; the first man received a small stuffed elephant, the second a larger stuffed elephant. The woman, after affirming her faith in the GNP, received a stuffed elephant which took four people to carry. The elephant hunt was over...
Last July, when the truce talks got under way, the camp was pitched in an apple orchard which was off limits to U.N. correspondents. A U.S. briefing officer appeased their curiosity by showing them an apple from the orchard-the size of a walnut. There was an immediate spate of speculation on how big the apples would be when camp was broken, i.e., when the cease-fire was signed. Last week the apples were harvested by U.S. troops, packed in 25-lb. sugar sacks and handed out to Munsan villagers. And no cease-fire was in sight...