June 5, 1984

The Mayor of New Bedford said today that the city was prepared to use eminent domain to buy a local 120-year-old manufacturing operation if that would keep the plant functioning. As far as could be determined, the purchase, if it occurs, would be the first time an American city took over a factory to save jobs. The manufacturer, Morse Cutting Tools, has been owned by Gulf and Western Industries since 1968. But Gulf and Western is cutting back many of its operations and has put the plant up for sale, planning to close it if no buyer is found. Mayor Brian J. Lawler said the company had set a deadline of July 31 for deciding what to do.

The Cole National Corporation said yesterday that it was discussing a deal with Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Company, the leveraged buyout specialists, under which Cole shareholders would receive $39 a share. Analysts estimated that the completed transaction - after deducting debt - could be worth about $290 million, based on the company's 7.9 million common shares outstanding. The stock of the Cleveland-based Cole National, the nation's second- biggest toy retailing chain after Toys ''R'' Us, rose $2.25, to $34, on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday and, after its opening was delayed until 2:51 P.M., advanced another $2.50 yesterday, to close at $36.50.

Fragments of genes from an extinct animal, a relative of the zebra and the horse, have been found and reporoduced in the laboratory, scientists of University of California at Berkely reproted yesterday. They said the gene fragments are the first to be extracted from any vanished animal speceies. The genetic material DNA, was extracted from a scrap of dried muscle tissue found inside the skin of an animal called a quagga, The skin, preserved 140 years ago, had been kept at the mainz Museum of Natural History in West Germany. The species died out about a century ago. Revival of Species is Remote

-known, often misdiagnosed and mistreated infection, is causing a national epidemic of venereal disease. It now far surpasses gonorrhea as the leading cause of sexually transmitted disease in the United States. Chlamydia is afflicting at least 3 million and perhaps as many as 10 million people a year, or 5 times more people than gonorrhea; its incidence is rising with frightening rapidity, and it is leaving hundreds of thousands of women infertile, many of whom never even knew they were afflicted. Although this disease has been causing human infections for hundreds if not thousands of years, a reliable diagnostic test was not developed until the 1960's and the test is still not used by most laboratories, so complete national statistics are not available. However, recent studies at venereal-disease clinics reveal chlamydia to be the nation's fastest growing serious sexually transmitted disease.

A rogue wind ''from out of nowhere'' capsized the sailing ship Marques early Sunday north of Bermuda, leaving 1 crew member dead and 18 missing, just after the crew believed they had successfully weathered an Atlantic storm, the 9 known survivors said yesterday. They said that the sky had cleared when the sudden squall blew their ship onto her side and threw them overboard into a raging sea. With the other 18 crew members below deck, the ship skidded along on her side, then knifed under when her bow fell below a huge wave. She disappeared, they said, in minutes. Earlier reports that the ship was seen awash in 12-foot waves several hours later were unfounded, officials said.