11 and 9, They’re Set to Take University by Degrees

--Morgan and Alkes Price, 11 and 9 years old, respectively, are two brothers that you can safely call genuine whiz kids. The boys, residents of the Chicago suburb of Naperville, are already setting their sights on attending the University of Chicago. If you haven’t guessed by now, the brothers are child prodigies, in mathematics, music and language. Morgan will start as a freshman in September, and Alkes is planning to follow next year, according to their parents, David and Theodora Price. Mrs. Price, a Greek native who has a doctorate in archeology, said that Morgan was proficient before the age of 1 in both English and modern Greek. “He could talk before he could run, in two languages,” she said. And when his father, a British physicist, was doing research in Japan, Morgan learned the language before he was 3. Alkes, Mrs. Price said, broke a national record at age 8 by being the youngest child ever to score 760 in mathematics on the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

--”I didn’t recognize most of their faces, but after I talked with them awhile I sure remembered them,” said Bram Vanderstock, 69, one of several hundred prisoners of war who spent months and years in the German POW camp dubbed Stalag Luft III. Vanderstock, a Dutchman now living in retirement in Honolulu, was one of just three prisoners who escaped from the camp, made famous in the movie “The Great Escape.” In all, 80 prisoners attempted to flee through one of three tunnels--named “Tom,” “Dick” and “Harry.” David (Davey) Jones, a major general now retired in Melbourne, Fla., who, along with Vanderstock, was in Denver for the 40th reunion of the Stalag Luft III prisoners, said: “I can remember that crawl with those wet, dirty longjohns and crawling up into the face of the tunnel to dig.”

--Florida lawyer Charles Sinclair, 36, usually rides in his Mercedes-Benz behind the wheel. But this time he found himself in the trunk, after being kidnaped by two gunmen. It all began when Sinclair’s air-conditioning failed. After pulling off the road to check a fuse, he was confronted by two armed men asking for the keys to his car, his watch and wedding ring. “You’re kidding,” Sinclair replied. One of the gunmen put his gun “right in my face” and said, “Is this kidding?” Sinclair complied with the request and then was locked in the trunk. “I thought, ‘This was the last sunset I’ll ever see,’ ” he said. Sinclair threw a red triangular traffic reflector at a patrol car following him. The patrol car ran over it and disappeared, and Sinclair said, “My heart dropped.” He was rescued after jumping out of the car when it slowed down for a speed bump.