Well, the advice about finding another ttf font led me to install apple fonts through fink ( $fink install applesystemfonts) , then set my font.list to be the following:
MAPSCRIPT[1]$ cat fonts.list arial /Library/Fonts/ArialHB.ttf arial2 /Library/Fonts/Arial arial3 /sw/lib/X11/fonts/applettf/Arial.ttf MAPSCRIPT[1]$ and use "arial3". I now have labels on my map! Thanks to all, -W
