A&M's All-University Night
to be held in Kyle Field tonight
'85 Aggies' offense, defense
look good on paper as usual
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The Battalion
Serving the University community
Vol.81 No. 1 GSPS 045360 74 page 6 sections College Station, Texas Monday September 2, 1985
Mandatory
seat belt law
m in effect
By TRENT LEOPOLD
Senior Stall Writer
If you got into your car and drove
) school or work today without fas-
ming your seatbelt, you broke the
w.
Texas’ mandatory seat belt law olfi-
ially went into effect Sunday.
Under the law, everyone riding m
lie front seat of a car, truck or van
lust be wearing a seat belt.
But the law does exempt some peo-
Je, including those driving or riding
itrucks weighing three-quarters of a
an or more, those with medical con-
itionsthat prevent them from wear-
igaseat belt and rural mail carriers
ntheir mail route.
Until Dec. 1 law enforcement offi-
trswill give verbal warnings to those
tho don’t comply with the law. But
ckets won’t be given until after Dec.
Jim Adams, director of the Texas
lepartment of Public Safety, says the
iree-month transition time is de-
E [ned to give motorists a chance to
(into the habit of buckling up.
“Alter that three-month transition
ne our troopers will be issuing cita-
ons to those who choose not to obey
ic law," he says.
Both passengerVtind drivers will be
cketed. However, if the front-seat
assenger is between the ages of *4
nd 15 and not wearing a seat belt,
hen the driver — not the passenger
-will be ticketed.
See Seatbelts, page 7
W-a-t-e-r Spells Relief
Photo by Anthony S. Casper
John Roper. Texas A&M’s freshman lineman recruited from Yates High School in Houston,
from Houston, receives a drink to help combat participated in a scrimmage on Kyle Field. Turf
the 104 degree heat Saturday. Roper, who was temperature rose to 147 degrees.
Elena may hit
New Orleans
noon today
Associated Press
Unpredictable Elena, after being
stalled at sea for two days, strength
ened to a major hurricane with sus
tained winds of 125 mph Sunday and
headed toward the Gulf Coast, where
the second evacuation in four days
was ordered.
More than 400,000 people in Flor
ida’s Panhandle and coastal areas ol
Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana
were told to flee the storm.
By late Sunday, Elena had picked
up speed and was heading toward the
New Orleans area, according to the
National Hurricane Center. The
storm had spent much of the day
heading for the western end of the
Panhandle.
At midnight EDT, the hurricane
center estimated Elena’s eye was near
latitude 29.6 north and longitude
86.7 west, or about 125 miles south
east of Mobile, Ala., with winds re
maining near 125 mph.
Hurricane warnings were extended
westward from Yankeetown, below
Florida’s Panhandle, to Grand Isle,
La., about 50 miles south of New Or
leans. The warnings, which covered
New Orleans, included more than
500 miles of coast.
The storm, blamed for at least one
death, was moving west-northwest at
12 to 15 mph late Sunday, after mov
ing north-northwest at about 10 mph
for much of the day, the center said.
“It’s moving right along on a track
that would bring it in very near New
Orleans around midday tomorrow
(today),’’ a forecaster said. Elena was
about 225 miles east-southeast of New
Orleans shortly before midnight, the
center reported.
In central Florida, which was bat
tered by the storm Saturday, officials
Sunday lifted evacuation orders
around Tampa, letting some 500,000
people return home. National Guard
troops called out earlier Sunday to
keep restless evacuees from returning
to the coast were then told to check
identifications of those returning. **
Flooding continued Sunday alcmg
Florida’s west coast. Panhandle and
low-lying areas across the state, but
Steve Hull, a spokesman for Gov. Bob
Graham, said the extent of the dam
age would be impossible to determine
until the storm had moved on.
In the Tampa Bay area, strong
winds and storm-surged tides six feet
above normalhad caused extensive
flooding.
Elena on Thursday had forced
evacuations in the Panhandle, Ala
bama, Louisiana and Mississippi be
fore veering toward Florida's west-
central coast, where an estimated I
million people were evacuated late
Friday and Saturday.
Residents of the areas farther
north who were evacuated earlier re
turned’home Saturday as the storm
wobbled 80 miles west-southwest of
Cedar Key in the Gulf of Mexico.
AIDS
B-CS homosexuals disclose their fears about disease
ByAMYNETTERVILLE
Reporter
“Most say it’s not a fear you live
with every day, but I have changed
my lifestyle because of it. It shook me
fora second; 1 thought I really ought
to take it seriously because he was
somebody I had been with before ....
Ttmade me think.”
These are the reflections of a Texas
A&M student talking about how he
felt when a friend died of acquired
immune deficiency syndrome.
AIDS is a newly documented disor
der in which part of the body’s im
mune system is damaged in varying
degrees of severity. People with AIDS
are more vulnerable than other peo-
pletoalarge number of serious, often
fatal, diseases.
Alan Noah, public health represen
tative for the Brazos County Health
Department, says the virus is not
transmitted by casual contact, but pri
marily through intimate sexual con
tact.
Nationally, about 12,300 cases of
AIDS have been reported since 1981
when it was first reported. Texas is
ranked fifth in the number of AIDS
cases reported.
“Totals for Texas alone from Au-
ust 1980 to August 1985 show there
ave been 633 cases reported,” says
Charles Wallace, a Texas Department
of Health official. "There have been
340 deaths, which is a mortality rate
of 55 percent.”
Seven cases of AIDS were reported
in Brazos County between January
1984 and March 1985. Five of those
died and two are still living in Brazos
County.
Jean Mahnke, infectious control
nurse at St. Joseph Hospital, says
there have been two AIDS patients
admitted to the hospital in the last
year.
Many health officials believe there
are many more cases of AIDS in Bra
zos County that haven’t been re
ported.
Noah says, “What you have to con
sider is there’s probably more cases
out there in our area than are coming
to light. A lot of that is because of the
stigma surrounding the AIDS victim.
I would be afraid to even speculate
how many cases there are out there.”
He says the disease is a major prob
lem even in smaller areas such as
Bryan-College Station.
“There are some things being done
about the disease, but there’s nothing
concrete to say, ‘everything is OK
now, you can go back to being prom
iscuous,’ ” Noah says.
While only one has known anyone
who has died of AIDS, three mem
bers of A&M’s Gay Student Services
agree that their lifestyles have been
affected by the fear of contracting the
disease.
“I think it must be scaring a lot of
people,” one says. “I know I’ve
changed a little bit in the last year. I’m
not as promiscuous as I used to be.”
Another says, “There are still peo
ple who go out every night and take
out a different trick, but I think it’s
much less than it used to be. I’ve been
See AIDS, page 8
Holiday dreary
for 1.2 million
jobless people
ics, who are experiencing 11.2 per
cent unemployment.
But the decline of industries in the
manufacturing sector, a development
many blame largely on foreign im
ports, is hurting workers of all races
in the steel-producing centers of the
North and the textile mills of the
South.
There are 40,000 laid-off steel-
See Jobless, page 6
Associated Press
For 1.2 million Americans, the La
bor Day holiday honoring working
people is little more than a dreary
milestone marking at least six months
of being unemployed and searching
without success for a job.
The picture is particularly grim for
blacks, who as a group are experienc
ing a 15 percent jobless rate — more
than twice the national unemploy
ment level. Also hard hit are Hispan-
Texas Aggie Band preparing for untraditional beginning
Andrea Abat
Carol Rockwell
By TAMMY KIRK
Staff Writer
The nationally famous Fightin’
Texas Aggie Band is gearing up
for a year that traditionally has
been filled with football game
performances, military reviews
and parades.
But the band is no longer the
traditionally all-male organiza
tion.
Andrea Abat, 18, of, Houston,
Carol Rockwell, 17, of Corpus
Christiand Jennifer Peeler, 18, of
Ennis, are the first women to join
the A&M’s marching band in the
91-year history of the organiza
tion.
The three female cadets, all
freshmen, met the media for the
first time Thursday and said their
first days in the band had gone
fine and they had received only
encouragement from their male
counterparts.
Tom Hale, student command
ing officer of the band, said, “The
male members of the Aggie band
see no problems with girls being
in the band, and we expect no
problems.”
Hale said the women are being
,treated just like the other 1 ID
freshmen in the 300 member
band.
He said they march, drill and
are expected to behave like other
members.
Band officials announced ear
lier this summer that female band
members would wear the same
uniform as the men — khaki
shirts and trousers —when
marching on the field.
The only difference is in the
living quarters.
Jennifer Peeler
’ The women are housed sepa
rately in Dorm 5 with Company
W-l, a female unit. But, Hale
added, they are under the juris
diction of A Battery, a band out
fit.
When asked about Melanie
Zentgraf, the cadet whose lawsuit
made it possible for the three
women to join the band, all had
no opinion.
They each said they became
members because they liked play
ing in a band.
“It’s (the Aggie Band) the fin
est organization,” said Abat, who
plays the trombone.
She added that her decision to
join the band was made before
the case was settled.
Zentgraf, then a cadet, filed
suit against A&M in 1979, charg
ing that the Corps of Cadets den
ied women membership to orga
nizations because of their sex.
Zentgraf had not attempted to
join the band, but when her suit
was settled by the consent decree
in January, the University agreed
to encourage women’s partici
pation in all Corps organizations,
including the band.
The A&M Board of Regents is
appealing that decree, but, in the
meantime, A&M must obey it.
Peeler, who plays the flute, said
she was scared before joining, but
not because she would be one of
the first women in the band.
“I was scared being a fresh
man, but all the fish are scared,”
Peeler said. “That’s a universal
feeling.”
Rockwell, who plays the clar
inet, stressed the equality of all
freshman cadets and said, “All
the other freshmen and band
members are behind us.”
The equality was further
stressed by the three women’s re
fusal to pose for photographs un
less some of their fellow fresh
men cadets, all male, could be
included.
Hale said he didn’t think band
morale would be affected, despite
the breaking of the all-male tradi
tion.
‘T’ve seen three freshmen
orientations since I’ve been here,
this is my fourth, and this is by far
the most motivated,” Hale said.
Lt. Col. Joe Haney, band direc
tor, said attrition for the band is
about 33 percent over a four-year
period.
But all three women said they
are determined to finish.
“I started it,” Peeler said, “and
I’ll Finish it.”
Abat added: “I want to be
wearing those (senior) boots.”
Haney said not all freshmen
perform for every game, but it
would be unlikely to see a game
when none of the female cadets
was playing.
Haney also said that although
several women inquired about
the band, only three formally ap
plied, and all three were ad
mitted. But the three said they
were not recruited for band
membership.
The band will perform at 10
football games, Haney said. The
first home game will be Sept. 21.
The band also will perform at
three out-of-town parades.
“Hopefully a bowl game some
where,” Haney said. “We’re
counting on the Aggie foot
¥7
v