Aggie Daughter Called Miracle Child
EASTER SEAL GIRL AND PET
. . . Kimberly Badgett plays with dachshund
By JUDY FRANKLIN
Battalion Special Writer
They call her the miracle child.
Kimberly Badgett, daughter of A&M students, Mr.
and Mrs. John L. Badgett and one of the 1966 Easter
Seal Children for Brazos County, is a “miracle” after
surpassing all expectations since her birth in 1960, when
doctors told her parents she had only three weeks to live.
Handicapped with spina bifida — a crippling condi
tion in which one or more of the individual bones of
the backbone fail to close completely, leaving the cleft
or defect in the spinal canal — Kim began her “fight”
to live.
Her mother, Wanda, explains that the little girl’s
condition was later worsened by a severe case of myelo
meningocele. (The sac on her back began seeping fluid.)
Doctors at John Sealy Hospital in Galveston then told
the Badgetts Kim wouldn’t live.
However, she did miraculously survive, and this was
the first of her miracles. Physicians reported it was the
most severe case they had seen to survive.
Her parents rushed Kim back to the hospital when
she was six months old because the sac had greatly en
larged and ruptured. Mrs. Badgett comments that her
daughter had gone into a coma, and spinal meningitis
set in.
“We . . . had to ‘beg’ the neurosurgeons to operate on
her,” she adds.
Taking “the very small chance they felt she had to
survive surgery,” she says they operated, and — much
to everyone’s surprise — the operation was successful.
Kim went home, but had to return again four months
later.
Because too much spinal fluid had collected within
the skull, her head size had increased slightly more than
normal. She returned to have shunt surgery, which in
volves inserting a nylon tube from the head to the heart
to drain excess spinal fluid.
Doctors’ prognosis was that this would help for one
year at the most. Instead, ‘the miracle child’s” shunt
was successful for the next four and one half years.
Mrs. Badgett explains that as far as they knew at John
Sealy, this shunt lasted longer than any other for a child
producing as much fluid.
Almost five years old, Kim came to the hospital for
a minor bladder operation. However, this time she
experienced severe complications from a heart failure.
For the second time since birth, she was not expected
to live. And, for a fourth time, she surprised them.
Her mother says only months later, after they could
n’t arouse Kim one day, she was rushed back to the
hospital, where doctors discovered she had outgrown her
shunt, and it had slipped out of the heart. After open
ing her chest, surgeons found that calcium had deposited
around the shunt in the jugular vein and a new one
could not be inserted. However, they finally used a new
method to insert the shunt, which was the first time ever
done in Texas and had only been used seven times before.
The six-year-old girl now has parts of ^er “story”
told in several medical textbooks and magazines. Kim’s
father, John, reports that she is thought to be such a
“miracle” because of her remarkable post-operative re
coveries, which incurred no brain damage.
Since her last surgery, she has been examined by
the doctor who is head of the Spina Bifida Foundation
and who came to Galveston from England for a forum
on this crippling condition. He told the Badgetts he
felt that with proper braces and leg surgery, Kim may
someday walk with crutches.
Her father says she has very good arms. Although
she is paralyzed from the breast down, Kim has taught
herself to crawl by pulling with her arms and shoulders,
to roll and to go up and down steps. Now she can
swing, do chin-ups and ride on her father’s bicycle.
Wanda comments:
“Kim never questions why she can’t walk. She knows
she can’t walk and she just accepts it.”
A playmate asked Kim when she was two years
old why.
“The angels,” she replied, “told me not to.”
The Badgetts are now planning to send their daugh
ter to Bible school next year, but are especially looking
forward to next fall when Kim can go to public school.
Wanda says a psychologist in Galveston told her
Kim will never have to worry about her social adapta
tions — only her ability to balance her writing. She
adds that they never want their daughter to be a handicap
to the other children and especially to her teacher.
In fact, Carolyn Lewis, Kim’s pre-school teacher, sees
her pupil now as “very determined not to make people
feel sorry for her.”
The six-year-old’s father describes Kim as a “normal
child.” He explains that she gets into as much trouble
as her younger brother and sister and gets the same
amount of spankings.
The youngster chiefly likes Sunday school, day school,
TV’s Dr. Kildare and hillbilly music, rating “Won’t You
Come Home, Bill Bailey?” her No. 1 song.
Wanda reports that their daughter has been in
“love” with Dr. Kildare for two years and she even
plans to be a nurse when she gets older. Right now she
likes to play hospital and “prepare” her sister for surgery.
Registered physical therapist John Birkner of the
Brazos Valley Rehabilitation Center says with her in
telligence and will to do things, she can probably hold
a job someday.
Looking ahead herself to her own future, Kim com
ments:
“I’m going to marry me one of those Aggies named
Dr. Kildare.”
“He’s not an Aggie,” her mother tells her.
“Yes, he is,” she retorts, “because he goes around
saying ‘Howdy’ all the time.”
Volume 61
grab
bag
By Glenn Dromgoole
Almost everyone has their fav
orite tale about slips of the
tongue on radio and television.
There have even been books print
ed on the subject, but most of
their contents are not reprintable
in public media.
One of the most widely repeat
ed yarns, which has been attrib
uted to and may or may not have
been said by Red Grange, is of
the football announcer who be
came rather excited during a cru
cial play and blurted out, “He’s at
the fifty, the forty, the thirty,
the twenty, lookitthat
run.”
Jerry Cooper, Aggie senior who
co-emcees the Aggie Hour on
KORA radio every Tuesday and
Thursday night, tells a good one
on his sidekick, Tom Morgan.
The pair was discussing the Viet
Nam situation during a record,
not realizing the microphone was
alive. Morgan could be heard
saying, as the record ended, “but
I don’t wanna die in a rice pad
dy.”
But my favorite tale of woe
was spun by CBS news corres
pondent Dan Rather when he was
a student dee jay at a small
Huntsville radio station during
his days at Sam Houston.
Rather said he would work all
day on Saturdays from before
dawn till after dark, without a
break for coffee, lunch or rest.
‘‘I hated to complain,” Rather
recalls, “but I did get rather
hungry during the day. So I
asked the former Baptist preach
er who owned the station if I
could have 30 minutes for a short
noontime snack.”
He told the young deejay to put
on a 30-minute sermon by some
old preacher friend, and grab
some chow.
The next Saturday rolled
around, Rather placed the sermon
on the turntable and lit out for
the nearest hamburger joint.
Meanwhile, he ran into a female
acquaintance and had struck up
a lively conversation when the
hamburger proprietor called him
to the telephone. It was the sta
tion owner.
‘‘Have you been listening to
the radio?” he asked Rather in
a demanding voice.
“No sir, I’ve been e a t i n g,”
Kather replied.
“Well, I suggest you turn on
the radio, get back to the station,
take off that sermon and you’re
fired.”
Rather hustled over to his
truck, clicked on the radio and
heard a repititious “go to hell . . .
to hell ... go to hell ... go
to hell. . . .”
Cbe Battalion
COLLEGE STATION, TEXAS WEDNESDAY, MARCH 30, 1966
Number 291
YMCA MARRIAGE FORUM
Wassenich Says
Mixed Marriages
Highly Dangerous
By ROBERT SOLOVEY
Dr. Paul G. Wassenich told students Tuesday to beware of
mixed marriages and warned that even brilliant people sometimes
can’t realize the problems of crossing over from one following to
another.
Ending the 1966 series of YMCA Marriage Forums, Wassenich,
religious educator, minister and marriage counselor from Texas
Christian University, advanced arguments against the idea of “Marry
ing Outside Your Faith.”
“Some people feel marriage and religion don’t mix, so they give
up religion,” he said.
“Man must live with faith too, not just faith in himself or God,
but an outgoing, brotherly faith in others,” he added.
He said many people today are looking for a faith but are
against institutions with the church structure.
“SEX REVEALS we are incomplete by ourselves. The basis
of life is a successful relation with one another.
T don’t think the individual alone can do anything. Faith
in one’s church and religion are most important to marriage,”
he said.
Young people today tend toward the theory of existentialism;
the idea that stresses the individual’s responsibility for making
himself what he is, ultimately deciding who he is, what he is and
where he is going.
But Wassenich pointed out man is shaped from the time he is
born by the people, institutions and groups which form relations
to him and which always help shape, determine and guide the in
dividual in his decisions.
“In mixed marriages, instead of religion helping to nurture
the relationship, it only creates greater problems,” he said.
WASSENICH SAID because faith is so essential in life, if
two people with different religious backgrounds marry, the result
is indecision, uneasiness and many times divorce.
“People come to their minister or priest after they have de
cided to marry anyway. It would be better to think about these
things beforehand,” he remarked.
Catholics have made new provisions but still basically oppose
intermarriage, and they feel it’s their duty to protect the faith
of their people when mixed marriages do occur,” he noted.
“The Jews, the Baptists and almost every religion also seek
to discourage interfaith marriage, because they know the problems
that can stem from it.”
HE NOTED planned parenthood is out if one of the individuals
in a mixed marriage is a Catholic. Using artificial methods of con
traception leaves a feeling of guilt since the doctrine of the Catholic
Church is against such practices, he said.
“A mixed marriage lacks the basis of ideas, purposes and motiva
tion,” Wassenich said.
Where a couple is of the same faith, if they have quarreled,
they can go to their church and reestablish the essential and important
ideas of life, he said.
“Parents who are of different faiths lack a common relationship
with their children at the deepest level. The child is forced to make
a decision whether to follow the mother or the father.
“Parents who say they are letting their children decide for them
selves what religion they want to follow are really saying they don’t
place too much importance in religion,” he added.
HE SAID children don’t have a basis from which to choose the
faith they want to follow, and it is either the guilding hand of the
mother’s or the father’s religion that in the end determines the child’s
religion.
Wassenich admitted it is very difficult for young people in love
to realize the problems they face in an interfaith marrige, but said
some couples have, and can make it.
Wassenich offered these possible solutions to potential interfaith
couple:
1. Both could drop all church relationships.
2. Both could leave their original faiths and go to a mutually
acceptable third.
3. One of the individuals could voluntarily cross over to the
religion of his partner.
A COUPLE may be able to succeed if there is profound under
standing of educated people, who have a thorough understanding of
the various religions and their differences and then choose the
best for themselves, he felt.
PROF DISCUSSES MIXED MARRIAGES
. . . Dr. Paul Wassenich speaks at Marriag-e Forum.
Singing Cadets
To Begin Tour
A six-city, 1,400-mile spring
concert tour by the Singing Ca
dets begins Friday in San Mar
cos.
The 55-voice delegation is
headed by director Robert L.
(Bob) Boone and Pianist-Ac-
companist Mrs. June Biering.
Boone announced the Aggie
glee club will, except for the
first stop, give two-hour per
formances of inspirational, spirit
ual songs and show tunes.
Initial performance is set for
9 a.m. at Camp Gary Job Corps
Training Center at San Marcos.
Three 45-minute shows are
planned for the center’s 3,000
students.
Other appearances include:
San Antonio — 8 p.m. Friday,
MacFarland Auditorium. Spon
sored by the San Antonio A&M
Mothers Club.
San Angelo — 8 p.m. Satur
day, Sarah Bernhardt Memorial
Theater. Sponsored by the San
Angelo Chapter of the Associa
tion of Former Students.
Midland — 2:30 p.m. Sunday,
Lee High School Auditorium.
Sponsored by the Midland As
sociation of Former Students in
cooperation with the Midland
A&M Mothers Club.
El Paso — 8 p.m. Monday,
Ysleta Auditorium. Sponsored by
the El Paso Chapter of the As
sociation of Former Students.
Abilene — 8:30 p.m. Wednes
day, Radford Memorial Audi
torium, McMurry College. Spon
sored by Abilene Chapter of As
sociation of Former Students;
10:30 a.m. Thursday, Central
Catholic High School Auditorium;
12 Noon, civic clubs luncheon.
During the El Paso visit, the
Cadets will be hosted for a guid
ed tour of Juarez by the Rev.
John B. Rupley, father of Jim
Rupley, president of the Singing
Cadets.
The singers will be guests of
honor Tuesday night at a party
at the El Paso Rodeway Motel.
Class Runoffs
22 Officers
To Be Chosen
Twenty-two class offices, remaining- undecided from
the Spring Student Elections, will be decided in Thursday’s
runoff elections from 8 a.m.-6 p.m. in the basement of the
Memorial Student Center.
“There is always a decrease in interest in the runoffs,”
said Harris Pappas, chairman of the Election Commission,
“because of the fewer number of candidates. But the offices
at stake are important, so only a good turnout can guaran
tee a popular choice.”
Five Senior Class offices will be decided.
Contending for president are Louis K. Obdyke and
Terrel S. Mullins.
The vice president race is
between Gene Neal Patton
and Michael A. Calloway.
William Carl Haseloff and
Robert A. Beene seek the position
of MSC representative. Secre
tary - Treasurer candidates are
Melvin Wayne Cockrell and Den
nis N. Hohman, while Thomas M.
DeFrank and John P. Tyson are
running for historian.
In the running for junior class
president are Albert N. Allen and
Gerald W. Campbell. Maurice V.
Main and Clarence T. Daugherty
are running for vice president.
There are four sophomore class
offices to be filled Thursday.
Seeking the sophomore class
presidency are Larry Elwin Hen
ry and Leroy Edwards.
In the vice presidential race are
Harvey Lee Cooper and Bill Ed
ward Carter. Secretary-treasur
er hopefuls are Robert James Fo
ley and Allan G. Eliff while so
cial secretary candidates are
Richard Kurt Newman and James
Arnold Mobley.
Winners in primary balloting
included Joseph O. McNabb, sen
ior social secretary; Thomas Carl
Stone, Joseph Don Rehmet and
William Carl Haseloff, senior yell
leaders; Jack E. Myers, Richard
L. Kardys, Jerry Don Stevens,
James Halpin and Robert Pres
ton, senior Election Commission
members.
Kerry Williams, junior secre
tary-treasurer; John H. Daly,
junior social secretary; Ronald
D. Zipp, junior MSC Council rep
resentative; Walter Lee Cloud,
Robert Floyd Gonzales, Howard
Hensel, Michael D. Noonan and
Norris Henthome, junior Elec
tion Commission members; John
Donald McLeroy and Michael R.
Beggs, junior yell leaders.
Davis Gordon Mayes, sopho
more MSC Council representa
tive; Robin A. Young, Walter
Riggs, Stephen Anthony Collins
and Garland Clark, sophomore
Election Commission members.
Lily Day, Shindig
Highlight County
Easter Seal Drive
An Easter Seal Shindig and
Lily Day highlight this week’s
activities in the Brazos County
Easter Seal campaign.
The shindig, scheduled Friday
night in Lamar Junior High
School gym, will feature com
petition between high school
rock’n’roll groups. Tickets are
on sale at local junior high and
high schools.
College Station Mayor Ernest
Langford has joined Bryan
Mayor J. D. Conlee in proclaim
ing Saturday as Lily Day in the
two cities.
Grad Recruiting Talk Opens
Transport Meet Thursday
The type of college graduate
sought by transportation indus
tries will be outlined at a lunch
eon Thursday of the eighth an
nual Transportation Conference.
W. B. Johnson, chairman of the
board of REA Express, will des
cribe recruiting requirements at
the Memorial Student Center.
The luncheon is a feature of the
conference conducted by the Tex
as Transportation Institute in
cooperation with its advisory
committee. The three-day con
ference opens Wednesday morn
ing.
Johnson is also president and
chief executive officer of Illinois
Central Industries, parent com
pany of Illinois Central Railway.
His address is prompted by a new
logistics concept which has forced
management to broaden its edu
cational requirements policy.
A&M President Earl Rudder
will preside at the luncheon with
Dr. M. T. Harrington, coordinator
of international programs, offer
ing the invocation.
Six key industrial figures will
lecture during the conference.
They include B. F. Biaggini, pres
ident of Southern Pacific Com
pany; William L. Robinson, gen
eral traffic manager of Sears,
Roebuck; G. S. Sines, specialized
operations department of South
ern Pacific; Charles W. L. Fore
man, vice president of the United
Parcel Service; T. R. Cheney,
merchandise traffic manager of
Atlantic Coastline Railroad, and
M. T. Richmond, president of
Mercury motor Express.
Tickets for the Thursday lunch
eon may be obtained through the
Texas Transportation Institute.