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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 3, 1979)
The Battalion 'Ol. 72 No. 72 Pages Wednesday, January 3, 1979 College Station, Texas News Dept. 845-2611 Business Dept. 845-2611 Pre-season 4 showing The Battalion, like the hoary groundhog, will poke its nose out with another edition on Wednes- it will be out of the hole on a regular basis starting the 15th, the first day of spring semester classes. day, Jan. 10. Shadow or no shadow, fexas-size freeze curtails gas, power By EDWARD FULTON United Press International .rassed natural gas companies, includ- oe giant LoVaca Gathering Co. of I Texas, Tuesday cut or curtailed lies of natural gas at spots in every m of Texas in their struggle to keep jis warm following a bitter polar immediate result was that public companies, some operating with no l gas to fuel their generators, ex- ced power drains. The Texas Public Commission appealed to busi- and the public to use only neces- lectricity to prevent blackouts or outs. National Weather Service pre lows in the teens in most areas of early Wednesday, following lows freezing early Tuesday in all areas of ite. A gradual warming trend was ed late today. aca, which supplies about one- ofTexas’ total natural gas needs, cut “s by 50 percent to electric power land by 100 percent to commercial ether industrial users. LoVaca ks gas directly to most of south and P Texas, and sells its surplus to other Inies. aca cut its sales to Lone Star Gas north and east Texas from a high of illion cubic feet a day to the con- minimum of 220 mcf. Simon Barker-Benfield, public affairs director, said the curtailment did not af fect heating for homes, schools and hospi tals. “This morning’s (Tuesday) demand was extremely high, a rate of about 3 billion cubic feet per day,” Barker-Benfield said. “The company anticipated this surge with a procedure called Tine packing.’ How ever, that pack has depleted and it has to be replaced by more gas. The only way to replace the pack is by curtailment.” He said the freezing weather also af fected several areas of LoVaca’s operation, including compressors, treating plants and gas wells themselves. “Gas contains moisture as it comes out of the ground and it is freezing at the well head and causing delivery problems,” Barker-Benfield said. “For example, offshore platforms in the Gulf off of Matagorda Bay have been delivering 15 million thousand cubic feet, instead of (the normal) 50 mmef. ” The cutback was severe in Dallas and Fort Worth, where natural gas supplies were cut to industrial and commercial us ers, leaving Dallas Power & Light Co. and some Texas Power & Light Co. generating plants without natural gas. DP&L Vice President Bill Aston Tues day said a telephone campaign early Tues day to major business customers asking for voluntary cutbacks helped considerably. oor driving blamed r holiday death rate United Press International e Department of Public Safety Tues- Mributed many of the state’s 39 New i holiday deaths to poor driving con- ti caused by a weekend winter storm, aid the greater fault lay with drivers refused to slow down even on ice. aal DPS traffic figures indicated 39 ins died on state highways from 6 p. m ly through midnight Monday. Eleven e deaths during that 78-hour period |,on city streets, an unusually large j)er for a holiday period when most Occidents occur on the highways. ( was the icy roads,” said a DPS Isman who earlier had issued warn - for Texans to stay home during the jend. p'e ice kept some people off the roads, lot enough. For the those who were the ice just made it that much more erous.” st year 30 persons died during the period. The DPS considered that ex- ely high. it during the 1978 Christmas traffic bj, 57 persons were killed in 78 hours ig dry, warm weather. The DPS pes- itically predicted at least 35 deaths for 4ew Year, but no one had foreseen the t of the weather. polar front trailing snow, sleet and ’.ing rain struck Texas early Sunday and made roads extremely hazardous across the Texas Panhandle, where snow fell, to the pine thickets of East Texas and as far south as Austin. Freezing tempera tures glazed over highways even in the generally tropical Rio Grande Valley Monday night. The worst of the holiday wrecks oc curred Monday when a car carrying three persons in Nt Caney in Montgomery County was smashed by a train. All three persons in the car, Daniel Thomas Parker, 30, Sharon Rose Geary, 26, and Brian Raymond Jr., 6, were killed in the acci dent. Four others were injured. The first reported fatality of 1979 was Danaso Anthony Olivares, 21, of San An tonio who skidded his motorcycle off a city street and was killed. The DPS said his death occurred one minute after midnight New Year’s Day, and on an ice glazed street. He was quickly followed by Candelario Martinez Blanco, 52, of Raymondville who was struck by a car about 1:23 a.m. Monday a mile north of Lyford on U.S. 77. A few minutes later Charles Bohner of Perryton ran off an icy road in Dallas and was killed. The DPS said the 39 deaths occurred in 35 accidents. Six were pedestrians, four died in auto-train crashes and there was one motorcycle crash. and that the danger of brownouts or black outs was receding. “If they (businesses) had not responded we still probably would have gotten along,” he said. “But we were on the fringe where if we lost a generator, or had some other machinery malfunction along with a heavy output which we had then, we might have had one.” Alan Erwin, member of the Public Util ity Commission in Austin, said the threat of brownouts or blackouts existed statewide. “Due to the unusual weather conditions and the resulting curtailment of natural gas throughout the state, a critical condi tion has developed in which natural gas electric generating units are not capable of operating to their maximum extent,” he said. “Unless the weather improves a poten tial for additional brownouts throughout the state exists. The Public Utility Com mission asks that all industrial and com mercial enterprises in every sector of Texas take whatever steps possible to minimize their use of electricity. The resi dential sector is also asked to curtail usage to the maximum extent possible. Natural gas companies supply fuel based on priorities established by the state. Top priority goes to residential users, followed by hospitals, nursing homes, industrial users (including electrical generating companies) and then to commercial users. Most schools in Dallas-Fort Worth closed, and numerous businesses either closed or opened late in the day Tuesday. Texas Instruments, one of the largest em ployers in north Texas, did not open until the second shift in its Dallas, Lewisville, Plano and Sherman plants. By midday Tuesday, there still were 10,000 customers in Dallas without power, but that was due to the New Year’s holiday ice storm, and most were in areas where falling trees not only broke power lines but also pulled wires out of the houses. Alton Hafter, spokesman for Entex Inc. of Weimar, 80 miles southwest of Hous ton, said the city lost its natural gas flow completely at 8:30 a.m. because of a mechanical problem in the pipeline. The Weimar City Hall, heated by electricity, was one of the few warm buildings in town until Entex corrected the problem later in the day. Corpus Christi Tuesday reported a blackout. Bob Noster, spokesman for Cen tral Power and Light, said the outage af fected 2,500 people on the city’s southwest side, and was caused by the heavy cus tomer demand. John Poerner, chairman of the Railroad Commission which regulates utilities in Texas, said distribution was the problem. “There is no shortage of natural gas,” he said. “The system of distributing the gas itself is just not suffiencient to handle the quantity of gas that is in demand for these low degree mornings.” Ben Schoal, spokesman for San An tonio’s City Public Service, said it was converting to fuel oil in its generators. “There’s only so much natural gas that can be packed into the transmission lines into the city,” he said. “This is not new. This happens every winter when you have a severe cold snap.” , ’ *; . -Is* ■ ww. iiMi' ST;; - ^ , M gfe&li . Ire ; V-' ’>• ^ <, — 4* - % -v , .., , - I Chillier than Anchorage One of the harshest cold fronts ever to hit Texas left higher than freezing yesterday, ice can still be much of the state looking like a crystal fairy land. found on roads, cars and trees. With temperatures in Bryan-College Station barely Battalion photo by Karen Comeiison Airline flights interrupted; renewed violence hits Iran By SAJID RIZVI United Press International TEHRAN, Iran — Hundreds of Ameri cans and other foreigners fled Iran’s up heaval in U.S. Air force transports and commercial airliners Tuesday while more antishah demonstraters fell under the gun fire of soldiers. State Department officials in Washing ton described the air traffic situation around Tehran as “confused” and they said they have received reports that two airlin ers — one British, the other Irish — were intercepted by Iranian Air Force planes and forced to return to Tehran’s Interna tional airport. The officials said both planes were permitted to take off again. In addition the American Broadcasting Co. reported a chartered plane flying out its television film had been intercepted and ordered back to the airport. Officials in Dublin reported a plane leased by the Guinness Peat Brokerage firm, bringing out 37 British and Irish women who worked as cabin crew mem bers for Iran air plus eight passengers and a crew of nine, apparently was intercepted by an Iranian air force jet near Tabriz and told to return to Tehran. It complied and left again several hours later without inci dent the officials said. Creative glasstvork Hobby brings profits Battalion photo by Ed Cunnius ionnie Walton puts the finishing touches on one of her stained glass' windows. Walton teaches people how to make their own stained glass vindows and other things at her studio in College Station. By RUSTY McDONALD Battalion Reporter The sound of breaking glass fills the air. But, this sound doesn’t mean bad luck to Bonnie Walton, just money in the bank. The 29-year-old Walton owns and runs Walton Stained Glass Studio at 3810 Texas Ave., and the sounds of breaking glass mean that she and her students are at work making stained glass windows. “It sounds like Santa’s workshop in here,” Walton said. Walton was in Houston working on her medical technology degree from Herman Hospital when she got interested in stained glass art. “I worked in the hospital at night and had the days off,” Walton said, “so to kill time I enrolled in a class at Bolton’s Stained Glass Studio. After doing one window, I was hooked.” Walton said she taught at Bolton’s for five months and then she and her pharmacist husband, Tommy, moved to College Station. She said that Bolton’s helped her set up a studio in College Station and she bought the Houston company out, when she “got on her feet.” Walton said she has taught about 800 people how to make stained glass windows and lamps. She said about half have come back to make more. “People start out wanting a stained glass window and than find the price prohibitive. Then I show them how to make it themselves at a much cheaper price,” Walton said. Walton charges from $30 to $40 per square foot to make a window, but says it costs about half that to have a person do it themselves. “they use their time, not mine,” Walton said. “People like doing things with their hands, and I get a feeling of accomplishment when I see my students finish their projects and see how proud they are.” Walton said that this is a some what expensive hobby to get started in. Her class fee is $20 and she said the supplies, not including glass, run from $35 to $40. The cost of the glass depends on the quantity and type, Walton said. Besides teaching classes, Walton also does commercial or custom work and repair work on stained glass windows and lamps. She said she has done work for Danver s, Serendipity, McDonald’s, Taco Villa, French Royal Tot and French’s Care-A-Lot. Walton said her favorite windows are the two she did for French’s Care-A-Lot which were of Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy. Walton said that stained glass adds color and gives character to a room. “It gives the room pizazz,” Wal ton said. “We are not just limited to win dows and lamps, either,” Walton said. “We can also do front doors, room dividers, anything you can think of to put stained galss into, we can probably find a way to do.” Washington State Department officials said that in the light of the incidents, one of the American military flights was sent in to Tehran with the specific purpose of find ing out if U.S. flights would be forced down. The plane was not impeded, the officials said, and other military flights fol lowed to take out U.S. government de pendents. Premier-designate Shahpour Bakhtiar in an emotional broadcast vowed: “I shall not let this country be destroyed even if I have to die. ” He promised to free all political prisoners, allow political op position and end martial law “gradually.” But demonstrators who earlier shouted “Death to the shah” took up a new slogan, “Death to Shahpour Bakhtiar, henchman of Amferican imperialists.” Plainclothes men who demonstrators said were Savak secret policemen attacked opponents of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi and even passersby in Mashad, the industrial city of Ghazvin west of Tehran and the west Iranian city of Kermanshah. The opposition claimed an estimated 700 died. Other sources claimed the death toll might be even higher. In Rafsanjan, in southern Iran, uniden tified gunmen fatally shot the mayor of the town. Radio Iran reported. Doctors’ homes were set on fire and physicians were beaten in Mashad and Ghazvin in the worst backlash to the op position movement. One doctor was killed in Mashad, witnesses said, and several were wounded in Ghazvin. At least 24 people were killed Monday by plainclothes men who drove around Mashad in private cars firing into the air and at street crowds, witnesses said. In Firouzabad in south Iran, anti-shah demonstrators attacked the Savak secret police headquarters and freed people im prisoned in an underground jail. Several Savak officers laid their weapons down, reports reaching Tehran said. Military Premier Gen. Gholam Reza Azhari resigned officially Monday. He was told by the shah to stay on until Bakhtiar forms a cabinet. Parliament was expected to meet before the Iranian weekend starts Thursday. It will vote on his premiership and his cabinet, which Bakhtiar said Monday was “complete. The relative optimism on the political scene failed to calm public feelings. Nearly half of the people queuing up at Tehran’s Mehrabad airport Tuesday were Iranians anxious to get out of the country. Several Western airlines were expected to cancel flights. Air India, PIA and the Iraqi airways canceled operations in Iran Monday, denying the frantic passengers any connections to nearby Middle East airports. An estimated 700 American and British expatriates and their dependents were evacuated to Bahrain, in the Persian gulf, in airplanes provided by oil firms Monday. Davis retracts testimony; prosecutor voices doubts By STEVEN R. REED United Press International HOUSTON — The retraction of a por tion of the testimony of T. Cullen Davis has muddled his position on the critical topic of conversations he claimed he had with a Fort Worth lawyer while seeking advice about the propriety of discussing several slayings. Davis last week testified he acted to pro tect himself last summer when he feared an employee was trying to lure him into incriminating conversations about arrang ing the murders of five persons. Davis said he felt compelled to join in the talks with David McCrory but feared he was being trapped and could be prose cuted. He participated in the potentially dangerous discussions, he said, because he believed that was what the FBI wanted him to do in order to abort an extortion scheme in which McCrory was a suspect. But Tuesday Davis deleted his divorce judge from the list of names he said he supplied Hershel Payne when checking with the attorney to see if he was breaking the law by “talking about” killing people. “As I remember it now, I didn’t (men tion District Judge Joe H. Eidson),’’ Davis testified of his inquiries with Payne. “Did you have conversations with Mr. Hershel Payne in which you talked about killing people?” asked defense lawyer Richard “Racehorse” Haynes. “I don’t think so, if I did I didn’t mean to,” Davis replied. “Did you have conversations with Mr. Hershel Payne in which you talked about talking about killing people?” Haynes asked. “Yes,” Davis said. Prosecutor Tolly Wilson noted Davis had contradicted his earlier testimony and . read from Davis’ explanations of last week when he listed Eidson and four other per sons as having been mentioned in conver sations with McCrory. “And it’s your testimony now that you never did tell Hershel Payne that you were having conversations with David McCrory concerning killing Judge Joe Eidson, is that correct?” Wilson asked. “Yes,” Davis replied. Prosecutor Jack Strickland said he in terpreted Davis’ most recent testimony, ending his four-day appearance as a wit ness in his own defense, as recanting all five names but said it would be up to jurors to make their own conclusions. Strickland said Davis was “stuck with his testimony. “I don’t see how he could reasonably be expected to recant everything he said,” Strickland said. Davis was arrested Aug. 20 after meet ing with McCrory on a restaurant parking lot. McCrory testified Davis gave him $25,000 in exchange for evidence Eidson had been killed, although the judge actu ally had not been harmed. Davis denied the money was his, claims he was returning it to McCrory and never believed anyone would be killed as a result of his encounters with McCrorv.