Retiree Prefers Pistol to Pension

--Esther Snyder was certified by the Civil Service Commission to be one of 100 police cadets that Cleveland plans to hire. Snyder, 64, a retired teacher and a grandmother of four, says she wants to become a police officer even if forced to retire again when she reaches 65 because she’d rather be a “productive worker” than stay home collecting a pension. “I want to establish that older people have just as much right as anyone else to a job on the police force,” said Snyder, who gets $286 a month from Social Security. Snyder scored in the top 1% on the last written police exam, given in 1982, but must still pass a rigorous physical test, a background check, a psychological examination and 16 weeks of training. Even if she becomes an officer, she’ll have to retire on Dec. 1 when she turns 65, according to the city’s mandatory retirement policy.

--Former California Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown Sr. and his wife, Bernice, have given $1 million to the University of California at Berkeley, campus officials announced. Chancellor Ira M. Heyman said that the largest part of the donation, $700,000, is earmarked for the planned expansion and modernization of biological research and teaching facilities on the campus. An additional $200,000 will be used to develop an exhibition gallery in Doe Memorial Library. The final $100,000 will endow scholarships for students from Indonesia.

--President Reagan has invited Prince Charles and Princess Diana to attend a dinner on Nov. 9, the White House announced. The British royal couple will be visiting Washington Nov. 8-12 as patrons of a British exhibition at the National Gallery.

--Folk singer Arlo Guthrie was discharged from a Boston hospital after doctors determined that a small aneurysm that caused a partial blockage of one of his kidneys did not require surgery, a hospital spokesman said. “He’s doing fine. He feels great,” said Guthrie’s spokeswoman, Patricia Lampro.

--Barbara Evans testified that she was told she “fitted the bill” when she was interviewed last August in Aberdeen, Scotland, for a $6,600-a-year job with the Pritchard Services Office Cleaning Group. But then, she told an industrial tribunal in Aberdeen, Pritchard manager Terence Robertson later called her and said: “I think it’s best we hire one of our own kind, if you know what I mean.” Robertson testified that her American accent would be a hurdle in her relations with other employees, most of whom were “plain-speaking, broad-tongued Aberdonians.” The tribunal awarded Evans $220.