Chronicles - Chronicles `Help Hubert,' And She Did. The Washington Post, March 06, 1995, FINAL Edition By: Sarah Booth Conroy, Washington Post Staff Writer Section: STYLE, p. D03 Story Type: Features Line Count: 70 Word Count: 772 Not long ago, Frances Humphrey Howard celebrated her 81st birthday. Over at Warren Robbins's Capitol Hill place, 150 friends sang new birthday words to the Franklin Delano Roosevelt battle hymn "Happy Days Are Here Again." Some of the guests remember when the tune and the New Deal were young. Many still believe, with Mrs. Howard, in civil rights, arts, international accord, information exchange, perfectibility of humankind -- and that her brother, the late Hubert Humphrey, should have been elected Press to continue. president in 1968 instead of Richard Nixon. The day after the party, she told the Chronicler this story, now 54 years old, about one of her first efforts in civil rights. The reservations for the National Office of Civilian Defense staff party were for the Shoreham Hotel's Blue Room -- a very impressive place for the eager young women from the far reaches of the country, come to Washington to help win World War II. Frances Humphrey, in her twenties, thought she had the arrangements all put together -- until the guests began to arrive. "The manager said there was obviously a misunderstanding. The hotel didn't accept Negro guests." She was horrified -- but quick enough to summon up her most persuasive voice. "Surely not," she told the manager. "But if so, Mrs. Roosevelt will straighten it out when she comes." Eleanor Roosevelt, co-director of Civilian Defense, arrived and said firmly that there was no misunderstanding. Forthwith, her staff had its party in the grandeur of the Blue Room, and one more battle for the dignity of humanity was won. The world grew up with the help of the Humphreys. She campaigned for her Press to continue. brother in 1959, and she pasted placards on virtually every barn in Minnesota to bring the country "out of the shadows of states' rights and into the sunshine of human rights." To help in his runs for the Senate, for vice president and president, she said, "I resigned from more jobs than most people have had." Sen. Humphrey sponsored bills for civil rights, Medicare, Peace Corps, Food for Peace, Job Corps and Food Stamp programs and his sister was well known for her influence. The two, though four years apart in age, looked uncannily alike. Mrs. Howard admits she might have enjoyed being elected herself -- instead of volunteering -- to run the world, but "my mother always opposed it. `Help Hubert instead,' she said." When Humphrey wasn't running for office, his sister helped Mrs. Roosevelt with the newly formed U.N. Association, traveling around the world in the process. As a Foreign Service Officer, Mrs. Howard directed the Agency for International Development's War on Hunger. Since 1970 she's been at the Health and Human Service's Library of Medicine, bringing together biomedical organizations. She carries on her brother's beliefs with the Hubert Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs and the Humphrey Fellows, a program for international mid-career professionals. Press to continue. Robbins, founder of the Museum of African Art, credits Mrs. Howard "with talking it up, getting Hubert interested -- then helping the legislation for the museum's merger with the Smithsonian pass the Congress." In her Northwest Washington condominium, doctorates and awards are interspersed with pictures of Mrs. H. at inaugurations, at Democratic conventions (she's a familiar face) and with Elvis Presley. She remembers everyone's name and entire curriculum vitae, and she manages to look interested "in whatever anyone has to say," as Robbins puts it. Her cocktail parties -- for everyone from murder mystery writer Mary Higgins Clark to the newest scientist -- are true salons. Not that she stays home much. The Chronicler finds it hard to remember a party Mrs. Howard didn't attend. So it isn't surprising that everyone came to hers at Robbins's two Capitol Hill houses, joined in the middle, both filled with traditional African and modern art. Robbins said, "Jan DuPlain (WETA-FM public relations director), my co-host, and I . . . expected 75 -- about 150 came." Many had helped Mrs. Howard in her projects -- Sens. Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.), Paul Simon (D-Ill.), Paul Sarbanes (D-Md.) and Patrick Leahy Press to continue. (D-Vt.), Rep. Pat Schroeder (D-Colo.), Librarian of Congress James H. Billington, Smithsonian Secretary I. Michael Heyman, scholar Wilton Dillon, historian Joan Challinor, artist Lili Sarnoff and feminist activist Betty Friedan. Also attending were Mrs. Howard's children, Minneapolis Judge William Howard and Anne Howard Tristani, special assistant to the president of Puerto Rico, and their spouses and children. Mrs. Howard keeps up with them by e-mail. Mrs. Howard told the celebrators that she still believes "in never being a cynic. Life is action. Only through hope does tomorrow happen." CAPTIONS: Frances Humphrey Howard, left, and Rep. Pat Schroeder at the birthday party. NAMED PERSONS: HOWARD, FRANCES HUMPHREY; HUMPHREY, HUBERT DESCRIPTORS: Human rights