Friday, January 19, 2007

ART BUCHWALD - R.I.P. Normally I wouldn't have mentioned Buchwald's death, sorry though I am to hear of it. But the brief A.P. death notice has this intriguing paragraph:
Buchwald fired volley after volley of unrelated humor -- such as recounting a landing in the Dead Sea by helicopter and being asked to return some scrolls.
A Google search brought up nothing relevant. Does anyone have information on this story?

UPDATE: Reader Roberto Labanti has sent a copy of a Buchwald column that was published in the Washington Post, Times Herald on 23 March 1961 and which is the source of the paragraph. Buchwald reports on his helicopter ride to Yadin's camp near the Dead Sea, where a basket containing what we now know was Babatha's archive had just been discovered in a cave. Yadin then asked them to take the scrolls back with them on the helicopter. Buchwald reported that they were happy to comply, "not only because we were taking a small part in a great archeological discovery, but because it would also give us something to read on the plane."

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