Turning Out In Droves

In Ward 6, Precinct 3, election workers had their share of trouble Tuesday night.

After eight years marked by low turnouts, Harvard students have suddenly become involved in the last two elections, and Tuesday so many of them showed up to vote for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy '54 (D-Mass.) and Rep. John B. Anderson (R-Ill.) that the poll warden was still counting the ballots five hours after the polls closed.

For the record, 6-3, which includes the Yard and most of the River Houses, voted 286-123 for Kennedy over President Carter, and boosted Anderson to an even more impressive 286-40 margin over his nearest rival George Bush.

At the Corporal Burns playground, where Mather, Dunster and parts of Leverett House vote, the races were just as lopsided, Kennedy collecting 211 ballots to Carter's 78, and Anderson winning 108 votes to Bush's 17.

Citywide, Cambridge voters stayed loyal to Kennedy, whose local connections, not to mention the fierce campaigning of city councilor Alfred E. Vellucci, former councilor Mary Ellen Preusser and school committee member Alice Wolf, helped him.

19,105 Democrats voted in the city, 12,233 of them for Kennedy.

There usually aren't enough Republicans voting in Cambridge to make much of an impact, but many Independents requested the GOP ballot Tuesday, setting up a landslide for Anderson. Of 5755 votes cast, Anderson collected 3697. Bush was second with 1037.