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Vol. 88 No. 159 USPS 045360 6 Pages
College Station, Texas
Wednesday, June 21,1989
brmer students relive college days at A&M
Jy Richard Tijerina
TAFF WRITER
| While 480 incoming freshmen are going
trough orientation conferences at Texas
|i&M this week, 42 former students are get
ting a taste of what it’s like to be a student in
1989.
A total of 80 people, 42 former students
nd their spouses, have been spending the
leek on the A&M campus while participat
ing in the second annual AggieHostel, a
Irogram created by the Association of For
mer Students to give University alumni 65
nd older and their spouses a chance to ex-
erience what life at A&M is like.
Porter Garner III, field director for the
ssociation and program coordinator for
ggieHostel, said the weeklong event is
ased on the ElderHostel concept, a na
tional program that brings older Americans
Jo college campuses.
He said AggieHostel is different from El
derHostel because A&M’s program is
geared specifically for former students of
the University. The age requirement of.
having to be 65 or older means former stu
dents participating in AggieHostel grad
uated as long ago as 1925 and as recently as
1945.
Fifty-five people, including 29 former
students and 26 of their spouses, attended
the first AggieHostel last summer. Garner
said this year’s program was limited to 80
people, and the sign-up list filled quickly on
a first come, first served basis.
Nineteen participants of last summer’s
AggieHostel program returned this year.
Garner said this year’s AggieHostel was
easy to plan because the planning commit
tee was well-prepared after last year’s pro
gram. He also said more people came to
this year’s event because last year’s was suc
cessful.
“Everything we heard last year were just
glowing reports over what we did,” Garner
said. “We were professional and organized.
That’s what we were striving for, though.
We didn’t want to just throw something to
gether and hope they had a good time. Our
goal was to make sure they left here with
that type of attitude.”
Garner said it is a shock to former stu
dents to see how much A&M has changed
since they graduated.
“That’s what’s great to see — the people
who haven’t been here in so long,” he said.
“We’ve got one couple from Connecticut
who haven’t been here in 30 years. They’ve
toured on bus and they’ve walked around,
and they’re still trying to figure it all out.
Their necks must be sore with all the head
turning they’ve been doing.”
AggieHostel participants get a close-up
look at what being an A&M student is like.
They have been staying in Haas Hall, eating
at Sbisa Dining Hall and attending classes
all over campus.
Garner said the most important thing the
former students go home with after the
week is over is a greater appreciation for
what campus life is like today.
“It’s easy to sit at home in San Antonio,
Trinity or Marble Falls and read about
Texas A&M, but you don’t get a feel for
parking, dormitory living, food services,
class schedules and the general hustle and
bustle of living at a major university.”
To make their transition to 1989 univer
sity life easier, 20 A&M students work as
student hosts who serve as their advisers
during the week.
Uaura Schmidt, a senior English major
from College Station, works as one of the
student hosts and said the experience she’s
gained during the week from working with
the former students has been invaluable.
“It has been very rewarding and fun at
the same time,” Schmidt said. “You hear
some great stories about things that went on
when they (former students) were here.
Apparently, campus life hasn’t changed
much except it’s gotten a little more mod
ern.”
The AggieHostel participants can choose
to take classes including American Uitera-
ture, Healthy Aging, American History,
Gardening Fun, Floral Design and United
States/Soviet Relations. There is a computer
workshop and an art and sketching course
offered all week.
A&M faculty are teaching all the courses,
and Garner said convincing them to take
time out and work with the former students
wasn’t a problem when they understood the
overall concept of the program.
AggieHostel cost $350 per person, but
Garner said the fee includes everything the
former students would need during the
week.
“The cost includes everything they do
here,” he said. “They could show up here
with an empty wallet and wouldn’t have to
worry about a thing while they were here.
See AggieHostel/Page 4
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rms ICensus Bureau calls
^tes
Laredo ‘country’s
most Hispanic city’
Vlichael Framesl! WASHING I ON (AP) — Uaredo
of a New YorkoJjjj 5 the country’s most Hispanic city,
nily who testified| accor ding to Census Bureau figures
ance the spormBhat say the border town of “seven
;iness started by'fpgs and seven cultures” is now 97.9 ico.
Taercent Hispanic.
While Uos Angeles has nearly as
tany Hispanics as the entire state of
’exas, no metropolitan area has as
two years, a period not reflected by
the Census figures, due to the
growth of the maquiladora industry
in Uaredo and Nuevo Uaredo, Mex-
ation of organ
:tivity was an inis
lining the seme::
In its first detailed estimates of
Anton Valukass ij’gh a proportion of Hispanic resi
!g Bents as Laredo, according to Cen
sed his voice if 115 Bureau figures released Tues-
ecturn Monday >j f a y'
Franzese, whoitl; five other metropolitan
and a "liar." lf reas ’ n ^e country also have major-
■esented entertawy Hispanic populations — McAllen,
30 years andpercent; Brownsville, 81 per-
uhletec with BM ent l El Paso, 67.5 percent; Las
. iqgOs Bruces, N.M., 56.5 percent; and
Monday heAadB" or P us Christi, 50.5 percent,
af the nearly J|B CC0r< i in gJ o lhe figures,
the
■minorities by state since the Census
pureau conducted its 1980 head
:ount, the agency said Texas had 3.7
illion Hispanic residents in 1985,
jecond only to California’s nearly 5.9
jfnillion.
Hispanics accounted for 22.8 per-
|ent of Texas’ population in 1985,
|ip from 21.1 percent in 1980, the
Census Bureau said.
Texas also had 1.9 million black
|Indents in 1985, who accounted for
3V1X1112 If I’® P ercent of the population. In
™ *|980, Texas has 1.7 million blacks
^vho accounted for 12 percent of the
ftate’s population.
j Laredo, which describes itself as
little bit of Mexico, a little hit of
e federal court!* |p exas an( j a little bit of something
t after Gadd’stni more,” had 110,100 Hispanic resi
dents on July 1, 1985, a 19.4 percent
| "ncrease in the Hispanic population
'om the 1980 total of 92,200.
Miguel Conchas, director of the
aredo and Webb County conven-
on and visitor’s bureau, said the
ensus Bureau figure seems “a little
igh.” He said he would have esti-
lated that Hispanic residents ac-
)unt for between 90 percent and 95
ercent of the Rio Grande city’s pop-
S. AttorneyJob: ulation.
It the plea was fj? Conchas said the Anglo popula-
jion has increased slightly in the last
lly feel like hesl'j
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thing, distribute
irton said. “We't ( !
ronclusion."
& Bill Hint
neither Walters
e slightest idea
g,” when they gets
, but both
usual to malt j
he-table ag
iletes, despite
nent
Nuevo Laredo’s 61 twin-plants
have brought in mid- and top-man
agement personnel from outside the
state, many of whom are Anglo,
Conchas said.
While seven flags have flown over
the palm-tree lined city of conquista-
dores and cowboys — from Spain,
France, Mexico, Texas, the Republic
of the Rio Grande, the United
States, and the Confederacy — Con
chas estimates that if 97.9 percent of
Laredo’s residents are Hispanic, at
least 95 percent are of Mexican de
scent.
The largest influx of Mexicans
into Laredo was around the time of
the Mexican revolution, Conchas
said.
Nationally, the number of His
panics increased from 14.3 million
in 1980 to an estimated 17.5 million
by July 1, 1985, for a five-year
growth rate of 22.9 percent. The
growth rate in Texas was 23.1 per
cent.
Cities with the greatest concentra
tions of Hispanics, after Los An
geles, are New York, 2.3 million, Mi
ami, with 815,000 in 1985, San
Francisco, 775,000, and Chicago,
757,000.
The Houston metropolitan area,
with 595,000 Hispanics, ranked
sixth nationally, followed by the met
ropolitan areas of San Antonio,
568,000; El Paso, 360,000; San
Diego, 358,000; Dallas, 346,000; and
McAllen, 281,000.
San Antonio’s population was
about 46 percent Hispanic in 1985,
according to the census. The Hous
ton area was nearly 17 percent and
Dallas-Fort Worth area approxi
mately 10 percent, the census found.
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T OF YlW
UH orders completion
of sales in remaining
S. African investments
HOUSTON (AP) — The Uni
versity of Houston system has or
dered the sale by week’s end of all
its remaining investments in cor
porations doing business in South
Africa, officials said Tuesday.
The sale will successfully com
plete a directive passed by the sys
tem’s board of regents two years
ago. That action directed the sys
tem’s financial managers to com
plete such a divestiture within two
years unless it would prove finan
cially harmful for the institution.
“By managing our investment
strategy in a prudent manner and
by utilizing sound judgment, we
are able to remove the South Af
rican-related investments from
our portfolio with gains in excess
of 30 percent,” said UH system
regent Don A. Sanders, who
chairs the board of regents’ asset
management committee.
“Sell orders have been placed
with the management firms, and
execution of those sales is sched
uled for no later than June 23,”
he said.
Although the regents ap
proved the pullout on June 23,
1987, the UH system has with
drawn only about a third of its
$6.4 million invested in compa
nies operating in South Africa.
School officials said the with
drawal has been slowed by poor
stock performances and by the
stock market crash in October
1987.
The UH system also has ad
hered to the regents’ 1987 resolu
tion not to invest further in firms
doing business in South Africa,
where a minority of whites hold
power over a majority of disenf
ranchised blacks through the sys
tem of apartheid.
As of May, the UH system had
investments in about 13 compa
nies with South African-related
business operations. Most of the
investments are in the form of se
curities traded on the stock ex
change.
The University of Houston sys
tem consists of four separate in
stitutions — the University of
Houston, and branches in Clear
Lake, Victoria and downtown
Houston.
Tennis anyone?
Nine-year-old Clint Fatter of Austin hits a fore
hand to his opponent in the final match for
boys 10 and under singles during the 1989
Photo by Kathy Haveman
Quality GMC Texas A&M Open at Omar Smith
Tennis Center Tuesday afternoon. Fatter lost
the match 3-6, 3-6 to Tres Davis, 7.
Bush orders
new sanctions
against China
WASHINGTON (AP) — Presi
dent Bush ordered new sanctions
against China on Tuesday in retalia
tion for the government’s “wave of
violence and reprisals” against the
pro-democracy movement.
Prodded by Congress to take
tougher action against Beijing, the
White House said the United States
will seek to postpone consideration
of new loans to China by interna
tional lending institutions, such as
the World Bank and International
Monetary Fund.
Moreover, Bush ordered U.S.
government officials to refrain from
some high-level contacts with the
Beijing government. The order does
not affect routine communications
between the United States Embassy
and China but bars anyone of assis
tant secretary rank and above from
taking part in exchange programs.
“This action is being taken in re
sponse to the wave of violence and
reprisals by the Chinese authorities
against those who have called for de
mocracy,” White House press secre
tary Marlin Fitzwater said in a writ
ten statement.
Earlier Tuesday, the administra
tion made a public plea to Chinese
leaders to grant clemency to protes
ters sentenced to death and to par
don people arrested in pro-democ
racy demonstrations.
The death sentences, if carried
out, “could only deepen the wounds
of the past few weeks,” Fitzwater
said. He said Bush directed the State
Department on Monday “to deplore
the death sentences handed down in
Shanghai and Beijing and to appeal
for clemency in these cases.”
In announcing the new sanctions,
Fitzwater said the United States sup
ports “the legitimate democratic as
pirations for freedom of peoples
throughout the world. The U.S. will
continue to voice its concern and its
support for these aspirations.”
Fitzwater said the United States
“hopes that the current tragedy in
China be brought to a peaceful end
and that the dialogue will replace the
atmosphere of suspicion and repri
sal.”
“China is an important state with
which we hope to continue produc
tive relations,” he said.
Soviet ship hits iceberg; Norwegians
rescue all passengers, crew members
OSLO, Norway (AP) — A Norwe
gian coast guard ship cut through
thick arctic ice Tuesday to rescue
hundreds of people who had taken
refuge on ice floes and in lifeboats
after their Soviet cruise liner hit an
iceberg and took on water.
Some Soviet crew members stayed
aboard the listing 630-foot ocean
liner Maxim Gorky to keep it afloat
in the Norwegian Sea while the res
cue ship and helicopters saved pas
sengers huddling in blankets in the
37-degree temperatures. No one was
seriously injured.
The Maxim Gorky was carrying
950 people when it rammed the ice
berg in the foggy arctic twilight
shortly after midnight, while most of
the passengers were partying in a
shipboard nightclub.
“Suddenly there was a terrible
crash that almost shook me from my
bed,” said Rudolf Ludwig, 67, of
Wiesbaden, West Germany, one of
the passengers on the midnight sun
cruise who was evacuated by heli
copter to Norway’s Svalbard island.
“We were told to get into the life
boats,” Ludwig said. “We sat for five
hours among the icebergs. The at
mosphere was calm, and the Russian
sailors did everything they could.
They gave us vodka and whiskey in
the boats, since it was cold. And
blankets, too.”
The iceberg ripped two holes in
the ship, which quickly took on wa
ter. Passengers said three decks be
came submerged.
The coast guard vessel Senja, its
bow reinforced for icebreaking,
rushed to the area, about 300 miles
east of northern Greenland and 180
miles west of Svalbard island. It
reached the area about four hours
later, and Norwegian officials said
all passengers had been picked up
about three hours later.
Soviet ships steamed to the area
and took over rescue operations.
The Soviet news agency Tass said
the ship carried 575 passengers, all
but about a dozen from West Ger
many, and 377 crew members.
The ship set out on June 11 from
Bremerhaven, West Germany, sailed
to Iceland and struck the iceberg
while sailing around the Spitsbergen
island chain on its way to Norway.
The Norwegian Meteorological
Institute sends out weekly ice charts
of the area, but the situation changes
too quickly to be dependable for nav
igation, the Norwegian news agency
reported.
West German passenger Winfried
Prince said there was no panic, and
“the Russian crew has worked per
fectly in disembarking passengers
into lifeboats, and also the Norwe
gians who picked us up . . . have
done a wonderful job.”
About 120 Soviet crewmen stayed
aboard the Maxim Gorky to keep it
from sinking. Finn B. Hansen of the
North Norway Rescue Coordination
Center said the Soviet tugboat Saija
arrived with pumps and two more
Russian vessels steamed toward the
ship.
Law prohibits forcing
professors to retire at 70
AUSTIN (AP) — A bill prohibit
ing public colleges and universities
from requiring professors with ten
ure to retire at age 70 has been
signed into law by Gov. Bill Clem
ents, according to the Texas Faculty
Association.
“This important law ends age dis
crimination against tenured faculty
members in Texas 4.5 years ahead
of the time when the federal govern
ment is scheduled to do the same
thing,” said association president
Kenneth Margerison.
He said Rep. Libby Linebarger,
D-Manchaca, had sponsored the bill
at the request of Dr. Norman Wha
len, professor of anthropology at
Southwest Texas State University at
San Marcos.