European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 03, 1980, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Out totalling the total woman by Christopher Connell associated press if. Was the girl next door in some of correspondent i Zrnic Pyle s americana columns in the thirties but there is nothing Ordinary in the Assi duos life of Shirley Ann mount . Salesgirl ambulance dispatcher Secretary to movie stars Pat mom Mountain climber lawyer she is the second woman in . History to be a Federal appeals court judge could be the first to sit on the supreme court but for now is the first Secretary of education. That newly created Cabinet Post which became official May 4 after several months of organizing the new depart ment puts her in charge of a $l4-billion budget and up against some of the Murdiest bureaucratic backwaters in Washington. Her selection last oct. 30 surprised some Educa tors who fell the Job belonged by right to one of their own. The Choice also dismayed some admirers who consid ered it a Detour from a career path pointed to the supreme court. On closer inspection the Choice was not As far out in left Field As it first appeared. Hufstedler 54, comes from a background steeped in education. Her Laic Mother Eva von a Chron mount was a schoo marm. She herself has taught English shorthand and piano Par Timic and Given graduate seminars to judges from around the Globe. She was the ultimate Pat Mother serving on local and state education panels. She was an Active trustee at several colleges and universities playing a key role in tightening Occidental College s tenure policy and prod Ding California Institute of technology to hire women for its faculty. Along the Way she out totalled the total woman. A gourmet Cook who has raised a son she served As chief Cook and bottle Washer for her family while practising Law out of a Library in her los Angeles Home. She advanced from writing other lawyers briefs to a team of lawyers fighting for California in an epic Battle with Arizona Over water rights. In 1961, after Edmund g. Brown moved from the attorney general s office to the governor s mansion he appointed her a los Angeles county judge. In 1966, he named her a state appellate judge. And in 1968, president Lyndon Johnson lapped her for the Federal appeals Bench. For recreation she treks in the Himalayas. A practising egalitarian she memorizes snatches of Sherpa arabic and chinese before venturing abroad in order to say the polite things and show people you care enough about them and their culture to  on the Bench she was a vocal advocate for children. In 1973, when her colleagues on the 9th circuit court of appeals ruled that san Francisco s schools did not have to teach English to 1,800 chinese speaking Stu dents she dissented. Those students were functionally deaf and mule segregated by their classmates by language As effectively As any physical bulwarks she wrote. The supreme court agreed unanimously in ruling for bilingual Educa Tion for All non English speaking children. She is not a card carrying member of feminist groups. I Don t style myself As anything she says. I have always been a feminist in the sense i thought it was nonsense that women should do a particular set of occupations simply because they Are women. That s characteristic of feminism. But i View myself much More As a person who cares about seeing each human being develop his or her personal potential  in choosing Law clerks the looked for promising women but strove not to discriminate against men. Most of her clerks were men. Her husband sell a prominent los Angeles lawyer says she s always thought women can do anything men the ultimate Pat Mother Secretary of education Shirley Hufstedler can do and sometimes better. She feels the women s movement can be fostered by High Caliper performances by women in positions of  they met at Stanford Law school. Seth was graduated first in the class Shirley was tenth. Two months later they were honeymooning in a Cabin in the High sierras studying for the bar exam. At the Start Seth s career came first. She recalls i had an offer for a clerkship in the California supreme court. I decided not to take that because i know sch wanted to practice in the los an Geles  he became a partner in the firm of Beardsley Hufstedler and Kemble. She free lanced became associated with her husband s firm and also worked on her own specializing As a lawyer for lawyers. In i9s3 their Only child Steven was born. The Burden was almost entirely on her Hufstedler acknowledges. We put a Law office in at Home and for several years she spent a Good Deal of her time working at  i never stopped working mrs. Hufstedler says. I was writing a Brief sitting in bed about four Days after my son was born. I had child care in my Home but i wanted to be on hand so i spent a Good Deal of time with him when he was  an Ideal arrangement it sounds like it she says but there were lots and lots of times when it was Nec Essary to work in hours a Day Day after Day and also pick up All the other ends of my life with my family. It s a very difficult life. Worth it but very  when she came to Washington on thanksgiving Day Seth remained behind in los Angeles. Now they re apart 90 percent of the time and mrs. Hufstedler says it s just bad news. We re a close couple and have been for More than 30  she is a product of the West descended from Pioneer Slock. Her paternal Grandfather was an inventor and Engineer who helped Thomas Alva Edison wire the first hotel in the world for electricity in a Small Colorado mining town. Her maternal grandmother was blinded at age 7 by a quack who put a caustic in her Eye to treat conjunctivitis. She bore six daughters but Only Shirley s Mother Eva survived past age 4. Eva s lather a Stonemason abandoned the family in Colorado when Eva was 10 and Eva went to work at 16 to support her Mother. She taught without a College degree first in a one room schoolhouse in Eastern Colo Rado and in a Denver High school during world War i. She taught until she was married right after the first world War. All teachers who were married were fired then she says. She was an exceptionally gifted person  her late father Earl Stanley mount was a prosperous building contractor before the depression which wiped out his real estate holdings. The family went on what she Calls a safari  my father s firm bid on pea Public works administration projects during the depression. That meant we would limply be in a town Long enough to gel the Post office or the school building far enough along so that he could turn the matter Over to a superintendent and then we would go to the next town and do the same thing All Over again she attended a dozen schools in a half do in cities Between the second and seventh grades. It went like this Denver Albuquerque Denver  i a Denver Casper Wyo. Denver Dillon Mont. Los Angeles and Albuquerque she says. In Albuquerque prominent newsman and columnist ? Ernie Pyle hired Earl mount to build his Home. The families became close friends and the writer look i Shine to mount s Bright Young daughter. She was the girl next door in some of his americana columns of the thirties. Pyle introduced her to celebrities from journalism diplomacy and entertainment. Ernie and i were very dear friends it was not Romance but a close relationship she says As i grew 5 up he became a very affectionate companion. It we helpful to me in that stage of my life to have somebody who believed in me and my intellectual talents and knew of my interests in Art and  she sped through the University of new Mexico in 2 4 i years graduating at age 19 in 1945. She majored la business administration to please her father. 4 As a teen Ager she aspired to a career in the foreign service until she found it shunted women into dead end Jyh jobs. Near the end of College she considered Medicine put decided she could not afford it. Her 27-year-old Ion is a third year medical student at the University of Call if fornia at Irvine. A soon after graduation Shirley mount set out form i Angeles and a Job in advertising. Through Pyle who was killed by a japanese sniper in the Pacific later that year she had met actor Burgess Meredith who was to por tray the writer in the Story of .  by one of those fortuitous circumstances i happened to be on a motion picture lot and Meredith saw me. At that time he was married to Paulette Goddard and their Secretary left. He offered me a Job on the spot at twice what i was going to get from the advertising Agency. They had a Secretary she recalls. For a Kcjr she paid their servants took Dic tation worked with accountants and did All the sorts of things that these Days what you would Call an executive Secretary would do. Ita person were movie struck 1 suppose you d say the Job was glamorous. I was t actually  her actor brother Kenneth thinks she got the idea of going to Law school from working in Hollywood and seeing that the people doing Well were not the movie group but their  she is brimming with ideas on How to use her new Post to galvanize Public support for the schools to encourage Quality and to fulfil the nation s commitment to equal educational Opportunity. She says she look the Job because i believe in mid career changes for All kinds of people not simply to take sabbaticals and lie on one i Back and float Down the Mississippi but logo out and do something entirely  and the supreme court i Don t have any idea. That s a concatenation of circumstances which i am not Able to predict. If you look at who has ended up on the supreme court when almost All of them were surprised she says to ii a straight face. I prefer to be surprised. Page 14 the stars and stripes