!G77 complains that this is an unsupported control item.
!GFORTRAN compiles OK put program gives segmentation fault
!I have not checked the other control items but strongly urge a G77 style
!error message for standard but unsupported items.
!distilled from Meissner text book example
       program bug2
       implicit none
       character*(500)  String
       open( 1 , file = "str_500.txt", position = "REWIND" )
       read( 1 , * ) String
       close( 1 ) 
       stop
       end

str_500.txt contains

"A character string consists of zero or more characters. Even though it is made
up of individual characters, a character string is considered to be a scalar. As
with any data type, it is possible to declare an array of character strings, all
the same length. A substring is a contiguous portion of a character string that
has a starting point and an ending point within the character string. It is
possible to reference a substring of a character scalar variable or constant."