Soviets Name Mountain For Maine Schoolgirl

MOSCOW (AP) _ Soviet authorities have named a mountain in the northern Caucasus after Samantha Smith, the Maine schoolgirl whose world peace appeal won her a trip to Moscow and worldwide attention, Soviet media said Sunday.

Samantha was 13 when she and her father, Arthur, were killed in a plane crash on Aug. 25, 1985.

The official news agency Tass said more than 100 workers and students recently scaled the 13,200-feet-high previously unnamed mountain and installed a bronze bas-relief depicting Samantha.

Tass said a picture of the mountain and a letter signed by the climbers was sent to Samantha’s mother, Jane.

The naming of the mountain is the latest in a series of honors accorded Samantha. The Soviets have issued a postage stamp with her picture and named a diamond and a flower after her.

In January, a newspaper reported that a baby born in Karelia near the Soviet border with Finland was named after Samantha.

In 1982, Samantha wrote to then-Soviet leader Yuri Andropov about her concerns about nuclear war. Kremlin leaders responded and treated her to a widely publicized two-week tour of the Soviet Union in 1983.