A Disabled Couple Who Still Take to the Slopes

Plenty of romances have begun on the slopes and bowls of Mammoth Mountain. But Barbara Cutler and Michael Anthony have a different angle on the boy-meets-girl-on-skis story. He has multiple sclerosis, a progressive degenerative disease; she’s been legally blind since early childhood due to a congenital problem.

Anthony, a volunteer instructor for the National Sport and Recreation Assn., met Cutler, a psychologist, in a class he was teaching at Mammoth. He taught her to ski with the help of a sighted partner. “She got to be real good,” Anthony said--so good that the two are hoping to compete in the World Championships for the U.S. Ski Team (Handicapped Division) in Falun, Sweden, in April.

The couple, who live in West Covina, have been busy raising $15,000 each to cover the expenses of attending the championships, as well as a series of training camps to be held at ski areas around the country. Anthony, 32, who is also a salesman, said that Cutler, 33, has succeeded in gaining financial backing from organizations for the blind. She’ll compete in the downhill and giant slalom competitions.

Anthony, apparently the only competitive skier with MS, is still far short of his goal, although he has found sponsors including former Ram football star Merlin Olsen and the West Covina Police and Fire departments. He’s been forced to miss some training camps due to lack of money and is substituting daily dryland workouts at home. He said he studies race videotapes and is “trying to have it (racing) in my head and body as much as possible.” Anthony competes in downhill, slalom and giant slalom events with the aid of outrigger devices that aid him in balance and alleviate pain related to his condition by taking weight off his legs.

For more information about competitive ski racing for the disabled, write to the couple at 912 Blue Jay Circle, West Covina 91790.

Driven by Fancy Dreams

Someone’s going to open the front door Valentine’s Day and trip over a red Ferrari in place of the usual red roses. One catch: The fantasy car must be returned in 24 hours. It’s part of a Valentine’s package being offered for the first time by Budget Rent-a-Car of Beverly Hills. “In their minds, it (the rental) becomes their car,” said Corky Rice, owner of the Budget exclusive car collections in Beverly Hills and Marina del Rey. Budget operates a third exotic car location in Palm Springs.

When Rice got into the business a year ago, his company routinely supplied fancy vehicles for TV and movies, as well as for people trying to impress a client or a date. Rice decided his $5.5-million fleet of “mostly impractical” cars would make perfect Valentine’s Day treats, particularly since many of their sports cars come in Valentine’s red. One red Ferrari, a red Corvette and a couple of Rabbit convertibles in unspecified colors have already been reserved for Feb. 14. A dream car costs from $100 to $300 for the 24-hour period.

The cars will be delivered gift-wrapped. Once the owners-for-a-day get over the initial delight and look inside, they’ll find their vehicles stocked with Dom Perignon, crystal Champagne flutes, caviar, chocolate truffles and the traditional dozen long-stemmed roses.

Girls Get SMART

Girls Club of America Inc. has been awarded a three-year grant of $784,147 by the National Science Foundation to support the club’s Operation SMART, a program of informal education for girls 6 to 18.

The acronym stands for Science, Math And Relevant Technology, and, as club national executive director Margaret Gates observed, “Early test scores show girls equal to boys in their aptitude for science and math, yet by junior high school, girls tend not to pursue interest and ability in these fields.”

Explaining that the first phase of the program will be directed at early adolescence, girls 11 to 14, program director Ellen Wahl Sullivan concurred. “The years of early adolescence are a time when barriers to participation and sex role stereotypes can easily overpower initial interest in science and math. Operation SMART is designed to remove those barriers and enhance girls’ natural abilities.

“No matter what the activity,” Sullivan went on, “our goal is to promote girls thinking in a scientific way. We want to generate questioning, curiosity, exploratory urges, the habit of documentation. We want girls to build things and to take them apart: We want to encourage them to take physical and intellectual risks so that they discover it’s worthwhile to try, to come up with creative answers even if they’re wrong.”

Operation SMART began Jan. 1 at the Girls Clubs of Syracuse and Schenectady, N.Y., and Lynn, Greenfield, Pittsfield, Springfield and Holyoke, Mass. The program is starting up locally in Carpinteria and other Southern California locations. By the end of 1988, the GCA estimates Operation SMART will have reached 500,000 girls, 250,000 parents and 190 communities.

A Dream Is Stolen

The gold 1972 Chevy station wagon stolen from a North Hollywood gas station on Jan. 18 was hardly in the league with the Maseratis and Mercedes offered by Budget Rent-a-Car. But Sara Crossfield said that to about 100 people in Athens, Ala., this particular junker is “more valuable than 100 Cadillacs.”

When the car (Missouri license plate XYW 066) disappeared, it contained a selection of quarter-inch audio tapes and cassettes, packed in light-blue suitcases and a silver metal case. Crossfield, an elementary school librarian, said the tapes represent three years of “practicing and working our heads off” for 100 children and adults who had created an elaborate children’s musical, originally funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. Crossfield and a friend had transported the tapes to Los Angeles for a final recording mix when the car was stolen.

“It was sinful. It just went against every kind of thing that should happen,” Crossfield said, adding she’ll start the project from scratch again if neccessary.

But in the hope that the tapes are still intact, Crossfield is offering a $2,000 reward for the car and its contents. Sightings should be reported to the Los Angeles police.