The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, April 02, 1959, Image 1
Weather Today Warm, cloudy to partly cloudy through Friday. ■Wf BATTALION 51 Days 'til Final Review Published Daily on the Texas A&M College Campus Number 94: Volume 58 COLLEGE STATION, TEXAS, THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 1959 Price Five Cents A&M Appropriations Face Millon Cut The South Shall Rise Again This group injected the spirit of Dixieland setting for the annual Fish Day activities into April Fool’s Day festivities in Duncan when the freshmen became sophomores for Dining Hall yesterday. The day was the the day and the sophs took the role of fish. Final Show of Year Town Hall to Present ’141 Abner’ Tuesday “Li’l Abner”, an original musi cal comedy that features all of A1 Capp’s famous hillbilly characters, will be presented at Town Hall Tuesday at 8 p. m. in G. Rollie White Coliseum. The “zip and zingo” show will be Town Hall’s final attraction of the year. “This will be by far the most entertaining of any attraction ever offered by Town Hall,” C. G. (Spike) White, manager of recre ation and entertainment, said yes terday. “Li’l Abner” brings to life the lovable characters in the “Li’l Ab ner” comic strip created by A1 Capp. The characters include Li’l Abner, Daisey Mae, Mammy and Pappy Yokum, Earthquake Mc- Goon, the Skaggs Brothers, Moon beam McSwine, Available Jones and his sister Stupefying Jnes. “I saw the show in New York a year ago and to me it was more entertaining than ‘My Fair Lady’, ‘Westside Story’, ‘New Girl in Town’, ‘Damn Yankees’ or any of the other big Broadway musical”, From Gov. Daniel Batt Gets Citation For Safety Crusade The Battalion received a special merit citation from Gov. Price Daniel for outstanding service among public communication med ia in the Governor’s 1958 high way safety crusade. The award received by The Battalion was the only one given to a college newspaper. Othei awards in the contest went to 12 daily and 4 weekly newspapers, 16 radio stations and three as sociations. The Battalion also placed sixth in the national collegiate news paper safety contest sponsored by the Lumbermans Mutual Casual ty Insurance Co. of Chicago, 111. This was the eleventh straight year the newspaper, has placed in . Board Candidates To Speak Tonight » The College Station Lions Club will sponsor a meeting for the candidates for the A&M Consoli dated School Board tonight at 7:30 in the A&M Consolidated High School Auditoi-ium. Each of the nine candidates will be allowed five minutes to present his views to the public, said David R. Fitch, president of the club. Fitch will also serve as master of ceremonies at the meeting. The election to fill three vacan cies on the board will be held Sat urday at the school. Milton Williams and C. A. Bon- ' nen are seeking re-election. * The others filing are Albert W. Jache, the Rev. Charles G. Work man, George B. Hensarling Jr., Mrs. Raymond \B. Hite, Milton Ford, J. B. (Dick) Hervey and Harold E. Redmond. the national contest. Gov. Daniel’s award was made at the Governor’s Breakfast which was the opening feature of the Governor’s Highway Safety Con ference held on conjunction with the 20th annual Texas Safety \ssn. meeting in Austin recently. Gov. Daniel pointed out in announcing the awards that through the cooperation of the communications media and Texans 197 lives were saved under the 1957 traffic death toll. The issue of The Battalion which won the two awards was published prior to the Christmas holidays. Last Christmas was the third consecutive Christmas vaca tion period during which no Ag- •ies have been killed in automobile accidents. A special letter of praise was al so received from Col. Homer Gar rison, Jr., head of the Texas De partment of Public Safety, for the quality of the issue. Friday Last Day For Junior Pics Friday is the last day that jun iors may submit pictures of their girls as entries for Junior Class 3weetheart. Pictures must be turned in at the Office of Student Activities. Tickets are now on sale in Of fice of Student Activities for the Junior Prom and Banquet to be held April 11. Banquet tickets can be purchased for $1.50 per plate, with prom tickets at $3 with a due’s card and $5 without one. Music for the prom will be fur nished by Jimmy Simon and his 10-piece band from Houston. White said of the show. The show is being presented by Lee Guber, Frank Mprd and Shelly Gross, producers of the successful Music Fairs at Westbury, N*. Y.; Valley Forge, Pa.; and Camden, N. J.; in association with Norman Panama, Melvin Frank and Mich ael Kidd. Panama and Frank are the cre ators of the book entitled “LiT Ab ner”. Kidd, director of choreo graphy, is known for his dances in productions such as “Guys and Dolls”, “Can-Can” and “Finian’s Rainbow.” One of the nation’s top song writing teams, Johnny Mercer and Gene de Paul, created the musical scores for the show. Lyrics are by Mercer, music by de Paul, includ ing such great hits as “The Coun try Is in the Very Best Hands”, “Love in a Home”, “Namely You”, “I’m Past My Prime”, “If I Had My Drouthers” and several more. Both Mercer and dePaul are fa mous for their Broadway produc tions, and Mercer has written var ious popular songs. William and Jean Eckart, cre ated the scenery and lighting. Tickets for “LiT Abner” are on sale at the Department of Student Activities in the YMCA. Admis- -’on for adults is $2 and student tickets cost $1. Town Hall tickets will be honored. House Measure Hingeson Senate By JOE BUSER Battalion Editor Figures released this week show more than a million dollars may be trimmed off requested appropriations for A&,M for the 1960-61 biennium. Taken from the commiittee report on House Bill 216 which is currently before the House for approval, the figures show $7,391,805 budgeted, for the college for the first year of the two-year fiscal period. The college had requested $8,- 592,977. Figures for the second year (1961) are also sepa-* rated by more than a million dollars. Funds for teacher salaries for the 18 state-supported colleges were increased by 9.6 per cent by the House Bill. The additional monies were available on a student semester hour formula basis. Salaries at Texas A&M were cut $278,307 from a requested $3,395,207, based on projected enrollment for the 1960 term. The second year of the biennium showed a similar cut in salaries here. Departmental operating capital, instructional administration and organized activities funds also suffered severe slashes on the basis of low enrollment for the upcoming fiscal period. Library funds for 1960 suffered a $32,648 cut for the same reason. Vice President Eaid Rudder said yesterday that the cut in appro priations in the House bill was the result of a drop in projected en rollment as well as the drop in students in the current school year. Enrollment was estimated to be 7,700 by 1960 but the 400-stu dent drop this year did not support this projection, he said. No appropriations were made for student health services or in tramural athletics but the lan guage of the bill does not prohibit spending appropriated funds for these purposes. The House com mittee said they deleted the two from public fund financing be cause (1) neither was an educa tional activity (2) health service was not one of the things the college was created for (3) intra murals are not akin to supervis ed play, nor did they fall within educational functions of a college. Guide Posts To live in the presence of great truths and eternal laws, that is what keeps a man patient when the world ignores him and calm and unspoiled when the world praises him.—Balzae. Weaver Receives Harvard Grant Di*. Nevin Weaver, associate pro- fesor of entomology, is the recipi ent of a 1959-60 postdoctoral fel lowship from the National Science Foundation. He will enter Harvard Univei’sity next fall for a year of advanced study. A native of Navasota, Dr. Wea ver graduated from Southwestern University in Georgetown in 1941 and received his M.S. degree in botany from A&M in 1942 and his Ph.D. in entomology hei*e in 1953. Weaver joined the Department of Entomology in 1951 as an in structor. He is the author of more than 20 technical articles on honeybees and related subjects. Weaver, who plans to return to A&M College after his year of study at Harvard, is the son bf Mr. and Mrs. Roy S. Weaver of Nava sota. Weaving Exhibit Now On in MSC David Bradley, 1958-59 presi dent of the Texas Designer- Craftsman, is now conducting weaving exhibitions and fabric displays in the Promenade of the Memorial Student Center. The exhibitions and displays, sponsored by the Creative Arts Committee, will last through April 11. Bradley has held exhibitions widely over the United States. He is a member of the National Ad visory Board of the American Craftsmen’s Council. News of the World By The Associated Press Soviets Rattle Sabers In Berlin BERLIN—The Soviet Union Wednesday warned the United States to stop high-altitude flights to Berlin. The U. S. Air Force said it will continue them as necessary. Stepping up pressure elsewhere, the Soviet Union issued an order in Moscow temporarily banning all travel by West ern diplomats outside the Soviet capital and Leningrad— presumably because of spring military maneuvers. Meeting this head on, Washington restricted travel of Soviet diplo mats to the Washington-New York area in the United States. Both bans were effective immediately. The State Depart ment said the U. S. ban will be lifted when the Soviets lift theirs, but there was no immediate indication how long they would last. ★ ★ ★ Russian Embassy Personnel Expelled In Mexico MEXICO CITY—Mexico’s decision to banish two mem bers of the Soviet Embassy staff for involvement in the wild cat rail strike will be followed by other anti-Communist measures, informed sources said Wednesday. It is probable, these sources said, that the Mexican gov ernment will ask the Soviets to reduce the number of their embassy personnel. It now is estimated about 100. Ag Tells of Torture On Bataan ‘March’ llRl ''ril iililillill ■■ ■l §. - Hli< The Milton G. Alexander Family • . . death march survivor, wife and children By BOB EDGE Battalion Staff Writer Milton G. Alexander, a junior mechanical engineering major from Palestine, is a courageous man, because after ten years of working in a Post Office and at the ripe age of 38, he decided to go to college. Not many would have the cour age nor the self confidence to tack le such a task, especially with a family, yet this is just a sample of the courage and strength that Alexander used to suiwive the Ba taan “Death March” and three and one-half years as a prisoner of war. In describing the situation lead ing up *o the infamous “Death March,” Alexander stated that the battle for Bataan had been go ing on for three months and the American forces had been pushed down into the very southern tip of the Bataan peninsula. All who could make it were ordered to the island of Corregidor. The surren der of Bataan finally came on April 9, 1942. Alexander, who was a light-ma chine-gunner in the 21st Infantry Regiment, was suffering from a head wound from shrapnel at the time of the surrender. He explain ed that during the march, which lasted 13 days, anyone who lagged or fell out from sickness or to get water, was shot. Having only the clothes he was wearing when cap tured, plus his canteen, Alexander said that his weight dropped from 155 pounds down to 100 (they were fed one small bowl of rice a day). Nearly everyone was either wounded or sick with malaria, he stated. The march carried what was left of the prisoners to a railhead at San Fernando, some 80 miles from Bataan, said Alexander. From there he was taken to his first POW camp, Camp O’Donnel, which was located in the interior of the island of Luzon. From here, he said he was moved to four other POW camps before being sent to a camp in Japan. During his stay in these var ious camps, Alexander empha sized that the men had to help each other to stay alive. He re lated one experience where a fel low prisoner spent what little money he had left to buy Alexan der some quinine. He said that he was practically dead withrma- laria at the time, but later pulled through. His benefactor later died of malaria. On Oct. 1, 1944, Alexander was aboard a Jap POW ship, bound for Formosa, normally a two and one-half day voyage (it took them 39 days). Conditions aboard this vessel, he explained, “were worse than those I personally experienced on the march from Bataan. We were in a convoy of 13 ships, 8 of which were sunk by American subma rines before we reached Formosa. I was put in a hold which meas ured about 50 by 60 feet, with 500 other men. We stayed this way for 39 days. They fed us a cup of rice a day and occasionally a cup of water. Approximately one-third of the men didn’t make it. Alexander was later taken from Formosa to a POW camp 400 miles north of Tokyo, where he worked in a copper smelter. He said that the weather was pretty bad at this camp and he caught pneumonia and had both feet frozen. “Near the end, when the Japs tried to tell us about the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we couldn’t believe one bomb could do so much damage. We assumed there had been a massive air-raid. On Aug. 15, 1954, they brought us in from work and simply said that Japan and Amer ica were making peace. The next morning they were all gone except the Japanese commander. Alexander said that he was tak en from Japan by destroyer and later returned to the United States by ship. Among the awards and decora tions he received were the Purple Heart, the Distinguished Unit Badge with two Oak Leaf Clusters, the Combat Infantry Badge, the American Defense Campaign Rib bon with one Bronze Star, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Ribbon with two Bronze Stars and the Philippine Defense Ribbon. Air Force-9 Scheduled Tonight The Air Force Officer Quali fication Test (Sta-9) will be given for the last time this year in two sessions .today and Sat urday. The first part will be given to night at 6:30 and the second part will be given Saturday morning at 7. Anyone interested in taking the test should report to the De partment of Air Science Confer ence Room in the Trigon to night.