Viewpoint
The Battalion Texas A&M University Monday September 3, 1979
Is there life after A&M?
The summer’s over in Aggieland and more than
30,000 Aggies have swarmed back to College Sta
tion to begin another semester of fun, football and
flunking.
I won’t be here to join in the parties, though. I
graduated from A&M two weeks ago and I’m
getting my first taste of the what those already
there like to call “the cold, cruel world.”
This back to school issue ends my term as editor
of the Battalion. From here, I have to find what
those of us here like to call “a real job. ” This isn’t
proving to be easy. As comedian Robin Williams
says, “Reality, what a concept.”
Most students look at college as an investment of
time. After all, four years is not so very long when
you look at the benefits you will reap — hopefully a
good job that pays enough to at least live on. That’s
what I thought, anyway. But I’m finding out dif
ferently. I chose journalism as a career because I
enjoy it. That’s important — to like what you do.
Money can be secondary. Unfortunately, news
papers feel that the best journalist is a starving
journalist, so they offer a median weekly income of
about $160. I could make more by working as a
secretary, but then, that’s not why I went to col
lege.
While it’s imp>ortant to get an education in the
field you choose, it’s also impertant not to miss out
on the things that make college life here so unique.
I was a two-percenter when I arrived at A&M
my sophomore year as a transfer student. I thought
standing during football games was ridiculous —
not to mention tiring — and that traditions like
quadding and harassing p>eople who walk on the
MSC grass were childish. But as the years wore
on, I mellowed out somewhat and realized that
these traditions are what makes A&M different
from any other Texas university. Although I don’t
agree with all the traditions, I feel it is necessary
for Aggies to remain true to them or forever lose
the spirit of Aggieland.
Everyone says that an Aggie is a member of the
largest, most closely knit fraternity in existence,
but it is hard to feel like that when there are more
than 30,000 students, all with opinions of their
own, enrolled here. It’s difficult to keep traditions
alive with such a heterogeneous group.
One of the most popular sayings here in Aggie
land is “Highway 6 runs both ways” or translating
roughly, “A&M, love it or leave it.” Well to the
University, the students and my mentor. Bob Ro
gers: “I love you and I sure hate to leave, but I
must find out if there is life after A&M.”
— KAREN ROGERS
Murders a show of strength
Irish demand media attention
By DONAL O’HIGGINS
United Press International
DUBLIN, Ireland — The murder of Lord
Mountbatten and the almost simultaneous slaughter of
18 British soldiers in Northern Ireland by the outlawed
Irish Republican Army last week were intended to dem
onstrate dramatically the group’s terror potential.
The attacks coincided with the completion of an over
haul of the IRA’s fighting machinery, along lines bluep
rinted by its chiefs at a secret meeting in the Irish
Republic more than a year ago.
They aimed to lift the flagging campaign of violence in
Northern Ireland on to the front pages of the world press
and to show off their strength against the British army.
The IRA, one of the oldest underground movements
in the world, sees the present conflict in Northern Ire
land as the final chapter in its fight to reunify Ireland.
To achieve this, it must force the British out of the six
northeastern counties and unite them with the 26 coun
ties of the Irish Republic in the south.
IRA leaders believe they would find it virtually im
possible ever again to mount such a sustained struggle or
to win any backing from Northern Ireland Catholics.
If it were to achieve its goal, it would mean forcing
Northern Ireland’s one million Protestants into a union
with the predominately Roman Catholic south — a
move they are prepared to resist with guns.
Outlawed and hunted at home and abroad, the IRA
today bears little resemblance to the fighting men who
first proclaimed it 60 years ago.
On Jan. 21, 1919, Irish pxjfitical leaders met in Dublin
to form the first Dail Eireann (parliament) and to issue a
declaration of independence from British rule.
It declared the ratification of the Irish Republic em
bracing the whole 32 counties of Ireland. Its fighting
force, known as the Irish Volunteers, became the Irish
Republican Army.
That declaration signaled the start of the Anglo-Irish
war in which 3,000 men pitted themselves against a
British force numbering 60,000 troops and 15,000
armed p>olice.
The IRA fought a hit-and-run war of sudden am
bushes, booby-trapped roads and snipjer fire. It struck
quickly, then faded into the hills. Its campaign of guer
rilla warfare became a model for other independence
struggles.
On July 11, 1921, a truce was declared and on Dec. 6,
1922, Britain gave independence to 26 Irish counties,
maintaining its rule on the other six, which got their own
Parliament and remained part of the United Kingdom.
In a general election to test the backing for the treaty,
an overwhelming majority supported it. But a minority
held out against it. Civil war quickly followed.
The anti-treaty group was defeated. Many of them
laid down their arms and fought the settlement on a
political level. But a small group went underground. It
continued to proclaim itself the Irish Republican Army
and determined to continue the struggle until a 32-
county republic was established.
Successive Irish governments outlawed it. Except for
sporadic raids across the border and bomb attacks, it
proved ineffective and lacked virtually any support
north or south of the Irish border.
Then came the civil rights campaign in Northern
Ireland, when the one-third Roman Catholic population
took to the streets in protest against alleged discrimina
tion in housing, employment and voting rights.
Bloody sectarian rioting followed. The IRA stepp>ed
out from the shadows and proclaimed itself “defenders”
of the Roman Catholic minority against the ruling Pro
testant majority with its para-military p>olice force.
For 10 years the blood-letting has continued. The
IRA, at first with strong backing from Northern Roman
Catholics, gradually molded itself into a disciplined
force run on traditional army lines, with an unbroken
chain of command.
The British government abolished the local
Protestant-run parliament and ruled the province di
rectly from London. It introduced many reforms, in
cluding an attempt to set up a government in which
Catholics were included for the first time.
But the venture foiled under the opposition of Protes
tant extremists who organized a general strike, forcing
the power-sharing cabinet to quit.
Letter to the Editor
the small society
by Brickman
Legett has good history
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Associations for all,
all for associations
Editor:
We always did say there weren’t enough
women. But then that was back in the days
when Aggies numbered 14,000 and the
men outstrippod the females by 7 to 1. And
that was in the day when we talked about
beating the Gene Stallings hell out of t.u.
and there was some grass around the build
ings at Texas A&M.
We hated those days. Funny how they
don’t look so bad now. You’ll see what I
mean when you graduate and leave this
place. Funny, but student life is more ap>-
p>ealing than inflation, gasoline prices and
working for a living.
But that’s not the pxjint of my letter. I
wanted to talk a little bit about education
and Legett Hall. They’re related, you
know.
First, did you know that Legett Hall was
once on the books to be tom down? Yep, in
1970 they said it was going to be razed. That
was about the same time they tore down
Mitchell Hall and Guion Hall and other
such buildings. Tear them down, they said
— progress, you know.
A student group called "Please Save
Legett" committee went to work writing
p>apers and sending letters and holding ral
lies, and Legett got a stay of execution.
Eventually, former President Williams
agreed to let it stand. But, that was not until
a number of us got black-listed bv the Stu
dent Affairs office. A listing that lasted, by
the way, the entire seven years that I was
here — all the way past graduation; a listing
that closed a lot of doors for me.
We like Legett, because it was the only
f >lace in which mant of us could afford to
ive. It was a place where we could knock
around and be Aggies without getting in
trouble too much. It was a place where we
developjed friendships that exist still today.
It was a place where we made three dorm
movies that made all the newspapers and
that fell in and out of love. And a place
where the realization was made that school
and classes often interfere with education.
Legett Hall was home for 180 of us every
year, and it has been home for more than
3000 A&M graduates.
That’s why I was a little surprised to see
that my old room number had changed
from 53 to 203 and that there are now ladies
in that place. We always said that there
weren’t enough women in Legett. But
what a surprise!
In closing I would like to encourage the
Women of Legett Hall to look into the
dorm’s p>ast. You’ll find that it held the Best
Civilian Dorm Award several times, that it
used to publish a weekly newsp>ap>er, that it
used to have a Tryell Council, that it used
to be the envy of civilian dorms on campus.
It also used to be a headache for the A&M
administration because of its pjowerful
spirit. A spirit that lives on today. Give’em
hell, Ags!
—Douglas Kirk
By DICK W’EST
United Press International
WASHINGTON — You say you’re a
young woman whose name is Jim Smith
and you feel lost in the crowd?
And every time you sign a hotel register,
the room clerk gives you a funny look? And
whenever you are introduced to young
men, they ask if you are from San Fran
cisco?
Is that what’s bothering you, Jim girl?
Well, cheer up! No need to sit around
the house and brood just because you are
having an identity crisis.
Apply for membership in the Jim Smith
Society and you 11 have someone to share
your troubles.
The Jim Smith Society, with interna
tional headquarters in Camp Hill, Pa., al
ready has three females among its 650
members. So you should fit right in.
I came across a mention of the society in
the recently published 13th edition of the
Encyclopedia of Associations, a reference
book found mainly in libraries and research
centers.
Many reference works tell us something
of the times in which we live, but the
Encyclopedia of Associations speaks vol
umes.
When first published in 1956, it listed
6,000 associations, give or take the Ameri
can Society of Parasitologists. The current
edition contains more than 1,000 entries
and the publisher is occasionally obliged to
bring out supplements to keep abreast of
the new ones.
This tells us the Golden Age of the Or
ganization Man rapidly is reaching the
point where two or more people can't even
get together for lunch without forming a
national association.
Picture two teen-age nitwits meeting on
the boadw alk at Ocean City and stopping to
admire the inscriptions and graphics on
each other’s chests and bosoms. That’s how
the Society for the Interchange of Remark
able T-Shirts was bom. Or so I surmise.
The I Have Lived Before Club, founded
just last year, now has 3,500 members and
28 branches.
Its credo, reproduced in the
encyclopedia, is to “make it safe for some
one who thinks he has lived before to dis
cuss it intelligently with others who believe
the same without fear or criticism."
The club's founding fathers obviously
were a couple of bom-again joiners who
recognized each other’s syntax from a pre
vious incarnation.
Nor does it require much imagination to
envision how the .American Association of
Aardvark Afick>nadoes, the Covered But
ton Association, the Manic Depressive As
sociation and the Central Premonitio, s Re
gistry came into being.
Thotz
by Doug Graham
How can you rHc 1
News Capsules
NATION
Four charged in death of baby » tland
Four men have been charged in the death of an Amish baby killed
by debris thrown at her parents’ horse-drawn buggy in Decatur, Ind.,
Investigators Saturday were trying to link the four to other attacks on
Amish families. Eight-month-old Adeline L. Schwartz was killed in
an attack on her parents’ carriage Friday night, police said. Rocks and
pieces of clay field tile were hurled at the carriage from a passing
truck. The child, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Levi Schwartz of Monroe,
had been lying in the back seat of the buggy. She was struck in the
head by a piece of clay tile and killed. Indiana State Police and Adams
County authorities arrested four young men and charged them with
battery. Authorities said the chargers may later be replaced by more
serious charges. Members of the Amish sect are sometimes ridiculed
for their disdain for cars and other modern machinery in favor of more
simple ways of living, including horse-drawn carriages and farm
equipment.
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BUSINESS
McKenzie
Spine replacement patient “stable
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The Baltimore surgeon who performed the world’s first successful
lower spine replacement said Saturday the 16-hour operation on the
semi-paralyzed woman was the patient’s “only option” for survival.
Jessie Thomas, 33, was in stable condition in the intensive care unit at
the University of Maryland Hospital. “Jessie was awake and com
municating in a rational way as she left the operating room,” said Dr.
Charles C. Edwards, chief of orthopedic surgery at the hospital. “But
the risk of the patient not surviving is still considerable.”He said the
mother of two children would be put in a cast and be able to use a
wheelchair within weeks. “It is unlikely that any important feeling or
movement will return (to her legs) and I don’t expect her to walk
again,” said Edwards. “There is only a remote chance that she could
gain enough function to go beyond a wheelchair.”
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‘Bye-bye” to birdie is premature
Arturo, a polyglot Panamanian parrot a woman told Chicago police
she had birdnapped, killed, cooked and fed to her 96-year-old
grandmother, has been found unharmed — although a bit shaken and
muttering to his owner in Spanish. Ida Sabala, 31, was charged with
burglary in the Aug. 27 disappearance of the bird. Ms. Sabala was
held in a police lockup pending her bond posting and will appear in
the Cook County Circuit Court’s felony division Wednesday. The
alleged birdnapper, police said, had a long-standing feud with Ar
turo’s owner, Robert P. Fox. It stemmed from her accusation that
Fox stole her dog several years ago when she lived in Fox’s building.
Police said Ms. Sabala, upon questioning after her arrest, had blurted
out her grisly confession of Arturo’s feigned demise. Fox said Arturo
was in “good spirits” when the two were reunited. “Just coming home
seemed to revitalize him,” the owner said.
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HEALTH (
Voodstone
Officials predict measles decline
Federal health officials say measles is declining dramatically in this
country and could hit a record low this year. The Center for Disease
Control in Atlanta said that if known cases of measles “continue to
decline at the current rate, the projected 1979 total will be between
13,000 and 14,000 reported cases, an all-time low for the United
States.” The big drop apparently was the result of a national effort
announced last year to try to eliminate the disease in America-excepi
for imported cases. Since then, many States'have begun strict
enforcement of immunization laws, excluding unvaccinated children
from school until they have proof of inoculation. Federal health offi
cials say this action has played a key role in reducing the number of
measles cases. In addition to stricter enforcement of measles vaccina
tion laws, the CDC said increased measles activity during 1977
helped diminish the number of people susceptible to the disease by
giving them immunity to the ailment.
Texan nabbed in Chicago bust
Authorities in Chicago who seized 30 pounds of heroin from a
Texas man, making it the largest heroin seizure in Illinois history.
Value of the heroin will be determined from lab tests Tuesday but
authorities estimate its street value may be as high as $30 million.
Francisqp Gonzalez Fernandez, 31, an illegal alien from Laredo,
Texas, surrendered Friday to U.S. Drug Enforcement Administra
tion agents and Chicago police after he was stopped on the Stevenson
Expressway. Federal and city narcotics agents reportedly found 30
pounds of Mexican brown heroin and $100,000 cash in two false gas
tanks in Fernandez’s truck. Bond Saturday was set at $300,000, al
though Assistant U.S. Attorney John Sullivan asked it be raised to $1
million to keep Fernandez from leaving the country.
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Portillo again refuses to pay for spill
President Jose Lopez Portillo Saturday summarily rejected talks
with the United States on damage payments for a runaway Mexican
oil well that is fouling the Texas coast. Departing from the text of his
third state of the union address, Lopez Portillo said relations with the
U.S. are “far-reaching and cordial.” But he reiterated his instructions
to Mexico’s Foreign Ministry to respond to Washington’s “recent and
public request” by saying Mexico does not recognize any legal re
sponsibility for the oil spill. Lopez Portillo and Carter are scheduled
to meet Sept. 28 in Washington. The president said Mexico has made
“extraordinary efforts” to control the well in Campeche Bay that has
spewed some 2 million barrels of crude to date. “I want to inform the
United States of progress and to say that we favor the possibility of
their Coast Guard to aid in controlling the spill at the 25th parallel,”
he said.
The Battalion
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MEMBER
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Congress
Editor Karen Bo)
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