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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 4, 1981)
p Page 14 THE BATTALION WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1901 Features The 'Great Drought of ’81’ kills crops snow, economies United Press International AUGUSTA, Kan. — Glee Ralston lived through the perilous days of the Dust Bowl era and survived the scorching Drought of ’57. In a half-century there’s not much a Kansas farmer hasn’t seen nature throw at him. Ralston isn’t easily scared. But even a 62-year-old Kansas farmer worries when the skies remain cloudless for months on end and heat and wind suck the moisture from the soil. “This is as bad as it was in 1936, as far as moisture and weather is concerned, ” said Ralston, whose fami ly has furrowed the land in south central Kansas since before Ulysses S. Grant was president. * “And feed supplies are in bad shape. Fortunately, we re smarter than they were back then. ” Agricultural expertise may be better now, but Midwest farmers are having more than a little trou ble recovering from “The Great Heat Wave of 1980” and coping with a drought that has lingered in the nation’s breadbasket since 1978. Fred Ostby of the National Weather Service says the precipitation level in the Midwest is 15 inches below normal over the past three years. He says this dry spell compares in intensity to the droughts of the 1930s and the 1950s. The drought’s effects are widespread. While far mers from South Dakota to Texas fret, some Colora do ski resorts have closed for lack of snow, despite calling in Indians to perform snow dances. Air pollu tion has increased in Nebraska, and the drought likely will drive up the price of a peanut butter sandwich. Even the Mississippi River has fallen to its lowest level in 111 years, causing navigation problems. In fact, much of the rest of the nation has been affected by the problem — a stubborn high pressure system over the Rockies. Even New York City Mayor Edward Koch has had to declare a water emergency in that city. But Midwest farmers — the people who put the bread on the nation’s tables — have been hit the hardest. Gerald McCathern, who farms 1,500 acres of wheat near Hereford, Texas, says the situation has become critical. “In the last three years, it (the drought) has really taken its toll," McCathern said. “There’s no way to estimate how much money has been lost. The drought, inflation and market price are all working together and have forced about 90 percent of the farmers in this area to seek refinancing through the government. “Another year like last year will put a large number of them out of business. ” In Nebraska, all but one county in the entire state has been declared eligible for disaster loans because crops and livestock were damaged by the summer’s triple-digit heat wave and drought. And in Missouri, the value of the 1980 corn and soybean crop was 3 percent lower. That was last summer. But this winter certainly has not helped the situation. Bob Swanson of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture called the Winter of’81 the driest winter in nearly 100 years. Illinois Crop Reporting Service spokesman John Unger said that state has been so dry that soil moisture supplies are 81 percent short. Dry winters plague wheat farmers because too little snowfall leaves a ground cover inadequate to protect dormant winter wheat crops from the cold. “We’re real short on subsoil moisture, which is real important to the winter wheat crop,” said Mike Kubicek, assistant diector of the Oklahoma Wheat Commission. “There hasn’t been enough moisture for the wheat to grow. “Much of our wheat was planted late and it just hasn’t had the adequate moisture to develop a good root system. If the winter remains dry and we don’t get adequate root growth, we could be in a great deal of stress in the spring. If we get into a severe cold spell for any length of time, we might see a lot of winter kill because of the shallow root growth.” Nor is winter wheat the only threatened crop. Bill Flanagan of the Oklahoma Peanut Commis sion said the drought-shortened harvest in 1980—50 percent lower than 1979 — has pushed peanut prices up from 40 cents per pound to nearly $1.50 for manu facturers. The prolonged dryness has also caused what Neb raska Air Pollution Control Chief Gene Robinson calls the worst level “we’ve ever had” of dirt, fly ash and other particles in the air. Meanwhile, the Mississippi, the nation’s largest river, has fallen to its lowest level since 1870 and its main tributaries, the Missouri and the Ohio, have become sluggish streams. The Army Corps of Engineers has begun dredging operations at some points on the Mississippi to keep channels deep enough for river traffic, and barge owners have been forced to lighten their loads to reduce the chances of running aground. A spokesman for Riceland Foods in Stuttgart, Ark., said the White River is so low that barge ports have been closed, forcing the company to t grain to a Mississippi River port. The Kansas Wheat Commission reports fa ing slowdown in grain movement to the GulfolJ ico has pushed wheat prices up sharply. Just as barge traffic has slowed on the Miss so has the stream of skiers to Colorado. Tliei(| hasn’t been enough snow. Breckenridge, Colo., resort manager Jim Gl| he lost almost all of his Christmas businessb the barren slopes. In Steamboat Springs,! percent of the ski runs are open and the towij mates it has lost $6.5 million in business. without measureable precipitation since ttieKj al Weather Service starting keeping records i — went the first 26 days of the month will drop. When will the skies open up and dump sum the Colorado ski slopes, swell the Mississippi and dump moisture on Glee Ralston's No one is sure. Fred Ostby of the National Weather Servict he’s uncertain because the jet stream which® brings moisture from the Pacific Ocean conti* be diverted toward Canada. LUNCH SPECIAL I Last crank phone system is Americana; I DOMINO’S PIZZA Good Only 11:30 AM-4:30 PM I pushbuttons coming soon, owner By RIC Sp The Univen touncil authi range Mondr nnghorns gai niversity to T College The move 1 ince last mont all 693-2335 I $2.00 OFF ANY LARGE 2 OR MORE ITEM PIZZA I I OR $1.00 OFF ANY SMALL 2 OR MORE ITEM PIZZA. I I ONE COUPON PER PIZZA. FREE DELIVERY WITHIN LIMITED AREA.- COLLEGE STATION STORE ONLY. 1504 H0LLEMAN — EXPIRES 2-28-81. United Press International BRYANT POND, Maine — Most folks in Bryant Pond don’t bother with things like telephone numbers. They just crank up the old phone on the wall and ask the operator to call the neighbor. The lakeside community of 1,000 residents in western Maine is the only town in the nation that still uses crank phones. But Elden Hathaway, the owner of the Bryant Pond Tele phone Co., says it may not be long before his customers have to start getting used to the new-fangled dials and push buttons, like other Amer icans. After 30 years in the business, he WANT TO STUDY OVERSEAS? NEED FINANCIAL HELP? The MSC OVERSEAS LOAN FUND is available for students interested in over seas travel. Information, applications & interview sign ups at secretary’s desk in Rm. 216 MSC. Sign up by Monday, February 9th. Interviews will be conducted February 11,12 EXTRA MONEY ATTENTION — Students, Faculty, Employees of thej$!; Texas A&M System, and others: WOULD YOU LIKE TO EARN EXTRA MONEY? liyou, your parents, relatives or friends own 500 acres or $ more and would be interested in leasing for oil and gas, £!; we will pay you a finders fee for just a name, phone number, and location of the tract of land if in the event we |? buy the lease. CALL COLLECT: GARRY OR LARRY KENT 713-723-2388 DAY OR NIGHT 713-652-4969 HAROLD KENT 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Mon.-Fri. y a says he is looking for a buyer for his tiny company. “I’m not going to keep it too much longer, my overhead’s too high hav ing to pay the operators,” said the 63-year-old Hathaway, whose living room serves as the company’s main office. “I won’t go automated, but some body else will,” he predicted. The phone company had 31 lines when the weathered, bearded Hath away bought it in 1951. His phone number is 32. The system now has 208 lines serv ing 440 customers, or about 700 resi dents, most of them sharing party lines. “Operator, can I help you?” answered Linda Fraser. The “drop” on the antique wooden switchboard had fallen over hole 122. Number 122 had just cranked, wanting to talk to 155. “I’m sorry, that number’s busy,” Fraser said. There was already a wire plugged into hole 155. “I think a lot of people in town couldn’t cope if we weren’t here,” the operator said. “They ask for names, they don’t even know peo ple’s numbers. “And we’re always asked what time the church service starts, the dump hours and the library hours,” she said. “Old people take naps and ask us not to ring them for a couple of hours.” Bryant Pond became the last crank system in the country last year, after residents of Grand River, Iowa, voted 121-73 to go modern. The system can call all over the world. Cards listing toll calls are punched on a time clock for billing purposes. “I’ve gotten Belgium quicker than West Paris sometimes,” said Fraser. Belgium is the European country. The town of West Paris is 8 miles c Director Bi jssed it with r O 'W7 O j lirector Marv ^ 1 mual meeting J -■exas A&M I vintage telephones, wall d with two mounted bells and‘i lesticks” — thin hand-h models popular in the 18 call them “Bonnie and Clydes,' At the nearby Boiler 1 taurant, a candlestick sits ontlel lea before llin'gton. The Texas c oposed chan ttle discussii mild mean bo e game with < ration after a “It’s worth every penny d aggravation,” said co-owner Li Tuesday, Robiller. “It’s a bastion of Amenpice confirme they haven’t done away with,a would be a shame if they did,' UNIVERSITY LUTHERAN CHAPEL 315 N. College Main - 846-6687 Hubert Beck, Pastor WHAT DOES THE LUTHERAN CHURCH TEACH AND CONFESS? WE ARE BEGINNING A STUDY OF THE TEACHINGS OF THE LUTHERAN CHURCH OF SUNDAY AFTERNOON AT 4 P.M. THESE SESSIONS ARE FOR THOSE WHO MAY WISH TO FIND OUT WHAT THE LUTHERAN CHURCH TEACHES, FOR THOSE WHO WISH TO REVIEW BASIC CHRISTIAN TEACHINGS, OR FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE INTERESTED IN JOINING THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. WE INVITE YOUR ATTENDANCE. WORSHIP SERVICES AT 9:15 Att. AND 10:45 A.M. BIBLE CLASS 9:30 a.m. Fellowship Supper 6 pjn. Holy Communion (Folk Setting) 7 p.m. away. Hathaway, who worked for 40 years on the Grand Trunk Railroad, keeps an old caboose on his side yard — equipped with beds, a gas stove bought for “a half-gallon of vodka” and a crank phone. A friend recently slept there “when his wife kicked him out.” His cluttered house is filled with Hathaway said he has hadsn offers from other small telefl companies and individuals, bul no rush to sell out. “Whenever the price and the is riEht,” he said. But he confessed, “It’ll be day for me when I have to give and she goes automated, a: people feel the same way. the Smithsonian should comeii make it into a museum.” Eclip se groupies chase the sun ay rivalry wo The Athletii had alrea Tam United I’r PH1LADELJ irennial sta jrld’s best 20 e Tanner sat < d took a lor reer. MSC BLACK AWARENESS COMMITTEE MSC ARTS COMMITTEE KERMIT OLIVER RETROSPECTIVE 1968-1981 February 3 through February 27 There will be a Reception in the MSC Arts Gallery on Tuesday, February 4, 1981, 7:30-8:30 p.m. Everyone jnvited. United Press International It used to be that the status thing to do was to escape to Pago Pago, peel down to the bare essentials and sit under palm trees sipping cooling beverages while everyone else was home worrying about the stock market. Now status-seekers have found something more stimulating than ex otic Pago Pago: watching the total eclipse of the sun while sipping cool ing drinks aboard a luxury liner. July 31, a select group of high seas adventurers will be aboard the Brit ish cruise ship Coral Princess chas ing the path of a total eclipse of the sun. The ship will, in fact, serve as a mobile observatory for 500 scientific and non-scientific “eclipse groupies,” and even, perhaps, a few celebrities. The cruise, dubbed Voyage to Darkness VII (the seventh such ex pedition), departs Tokyo on July 27 on an 8-day sail to pass through the narrow path of the moon’s shadow, 1,200 miles off the east coast of Japan. The completely stabilized, 10,000-ton Coral Princess will be equipped with state-of-the-art elec tronic and optical apparatus for view ing the eclipse as well as solar scien tists and others who will teach on board seminars to the eclipse hun ters. The ship will use continuous weather data from satellites which will enable the expedition’s meteorologist Edward M. Brooks to chart the liner’s course to the clearest possible observing site — about 40 degrees north latitude by 166 degress east longitude. clipsec# ing: Brooks, professor of geophyj Boston College, who has madts eclipse meteorology a lifetimf! ciality, has served as thetopwo man on the previous ecli The eclipse enthusiasts will* the solar event from positions) ship’s outdoor decks and they® so luxuriously, the cruise ol say, attended with food, drinli music from a dance orchestra At one point rving left-han the ranking?, my but quite r climbed as jacked the W TO. He also wc final matches The cruise will also feat® tures and a “Science at Sea” prof whose previous speakers ini science writer Isaac Asimov, fiction writer Arthur C. Cla former astronaut Neil A. Arnist The July 31 eclipse will te the Soviet Union and sweep* the Northern Pacific Ocean an end about 300 miles north d Hawaiian Islands. The eclips not be seen anywhere in the H States and the next readily accfi total solar eclipse over a largep 1 North America won’t occm 2017. In addition to the scientific'' tions, the release said the Corf cess will also offer all the luxui comforts associated with cm® comfortable staterooms, cuisine, swimming pool, and entertainment. The eclipse cruise, run hyO® Eclipse Cruises, Inc. ofNewW supplemented with a choice! 1 day, land-based excursions in or 9-day overland tours of Kong, Macao and China. Eclipse-chasing in si an idea of Dr. Philip Sigler, ap 11 sor of sociology at the City pi* ty of New York, with his wifirf and brother-in-law Theodore f* planetarium director at Yoturf State University in Ohio. Since 1972, more than 8,(KM pie have witnessed eclipses« ler’s “voyages,” five on cruise — one in 1972, two in 1973 p in 1977 — and the sixth in $ land-based expedition to Montana. Marcy Sigler, who handles?- ity, arrangements and almost* 1 thing else for the cruise as ^ serving as social director on l* 1 said the response to the ci# been unusually enthusiastic. “Some people said, ‘If you’**; one eclipse, you’ve got tose* 1 all. ’ Others told me ‘It was no 11 ary booze-snooze cruise.’ Anil aren’t. The social status lies i* binoculars or telescopes or rf and not in your clothes or wrf you,” she said. “Others said they had ^ thought they would be taught*® ce and love it so much,” she**' He called upc , to help hi “We discussei the playe s were cost ar, I let thing messing up: going throu tiled to do, w tennis or do fanner showe nday that he The sevenl For years that the mou Helens was i bomb that tel raining debri: ash covered Prior to the some defied leave for any happened. H Days later thi feet of boilint Many othe gathered for quick buck b; The story c living on the s have been fi economic eru what eruption social life. Yo Even God r long toleratec divine wrath v a tremendous passage of S stand?" With! Do you rea side of an awi buried under receive it. “Fc saved. He the and the dears storm of God’ flee into Chris name from de open my hear realm of judgr have never dr portion both r whosoever sh