Texas ASeM University
vM
Today Tomorrow
See extended forecast, Page 2.
jme 103 • Issue 167 • 6 Pages
College Station, TX
Monday, July 21, 1997
Iews
I at
EX sponsors fire
hool at Brayton
tore than 3,000 firefighters from
jssthe state will attend the 68th
ual Texas Municipal Fire Training
ool that begins today,
he Texas Engineering Extension
/ice(TEEX) is sponsoring the six-day
tat the Brayton Fire Training Field.
t8 p.m. Wednesday, a public
ronstration on the fire field will
leld.
lick Perry, agriculture commission-
nd candidate for lieutenant gover-
tour the facilities on Wednes-
and attend a dinner at the Brazos
iter with State Sen. Steve Ogden
State Rep. Dan Kubiak.
IS I!'!
It..:..:
Briefs Ags voice concerns on grave site relocation
tent of active researchers in-
nationally in their field.
rofessor recognized
ireconomics research
l
Jhe:
W
Itf
ie National Youth Sports
ogram wrapped up at
xas A&M this weekend.
See Page 3.
ano: Television medium
erloads American public
th extremist news coverage.
See Page 5.
SPORTS
OPINION
ONLINE
%;//bat-webTamo.edu
e e links
the FBI
Lepage.
ien
feM honors civil
gineering head
Dr. Ignacio Rodriguez-lturbe, head
he Texas A&M Department of Civ-
ngineering, was named a distin-
tied professor at A&M.
Ihe title is effective Sept. 1.
Rodriguez-lturbe is the author of
rbooks and more than 150 acad-
'fj lie articles. He has received
Pjards in Latin America, Europe and
United States.
Candidates for this title must be
^inated and ranked in the top five
Photograph: Tim Moog
Some Aggies are protesting the possible
relocation of Reveilles’ grave site.
(AP) — Talk to students at Texas A&M about
what makes the nation’s third largest university
special and they’ll tell you, one after the other—
tradition.
In the new student handbook, several pages
detail the school’s folklore, including the five-
story-high bonfire before football games
against rival Texas, the Aggie yells and how stu
dents symbolize the “12th man” by standing
through football games.
But none is more important than A&M’s
purebred American collie mascot, Reveille.
Reveilles I through IV—there have been six
dating back to 1931 — were buried with their
paws and faces pointed so they could look
through the north tunnel at Kyle Field and see
the stadium scoreboard.
It’s understandable then, that when the ad
ministration announced the grave site was be
ing moved to accommodate a $30 million ex
pansion of Kyle Field, a number of devoted
Aggies didn’t take it lightly.
Before proceeding with stadium expansion
plans, officials in the athletic department
gained approval from a committee of students
representing the school’s Traditions Council,
Student Senate and E-2, the company of cadets
responsible for Reveille.
But after outraged faxes, letters and e-mails
started coming into E-2 cadets, Jeff King, who
will be E-2 commander in the fall, began having
second thoughts about moving the grave site.
^ ^ ... We underestimated
the amount of alums who
were opposed to the idea.
Jeff King
E-2 Commander
“At the time, we underestimated the
amount of alums who were opposed to the
idea,” King said.
The grave site is supposed to be moved in
the near future to a garden area across the
Svetozar Pejovich, a Texas A&M
onomics professor, won the Tem-
ton Award for Excellence in Higher
for his work in the area of
opertyrights and the “new institu-
mal economics.”
teilutional economics examines
ie relationship between economics
tyi(ithepoMca\ and legal systems.
Mbe award is sponsored by the
raiTempleton Foundation.
Pejovich's name will be placed on
Templeton Honor Rolls as part
iie award.
it
j eteran pilot dies
»fiile testing plane
era 8R0WNSVILLE (AP) — A veteran
loyflwho designed aircraft as long
as the 1940s died Sunday
onienhis self-built experimental
lani fie crashed during a test,
jntli fllis V. Eichman, 84, had just taken
iihis plane, Aerobat Three, on Sun-
morning when it went down at
itifwisville Air Center.
‘The plane did not even get 6 feet off
toifffound before it just flipped over,”
oi URalph Mark, manager of the aircen-
1 can’t imagine what went wrong.”
alMark said Eichman had been flying
planes for a couple of years at the
wnsville Air Center.
Residents
evacuate
Alabama
Hurricane Danny caused
flooding in coastal areas
GULF SHORES, Ala. (AP) — Flooding caused by
Hurricane Danny’s torrential rain forced scores of
people to evacuate Sunday as rushing water
washed out roads and poured through homes.
The storm, downgraded to a tropical depression
as it weakened and drifted into the Florida Pan
handle, left thousands without power, boats
wrecked and homes damaged in southern Alaba
ma. One death was blamed on the storm.
More than 30 inches of rain had fallen on the
Alabama coast over three days, with even more
concentrated on Mobile Bay, where Danny
stalled for most of Saturday, the National Weath
er Service said. By comparison, the total rainfall
for all of last year at Mobile’s airport was j ust over
66 inches.
Rescue teams using boats and Humvees
evacuated scores of people from coastal com
munities Sunday.
At Fish River, authorities said 125 people were
evacuated, many by boat from half-submerged
homes. At one point the water became so rough
that one boat capsized and forced a brief suspen
sion of rescue efforts.
Some evacuees said only the water was so high
along Fish River that only the tops of some roofs
were visible.
However, the evacuation was not mandatory,
and a couple of dozen people apparently decided
to stay, said Jim Sabell, chief of the fire department
for Fish River and a rescue team leader.
National Guard officials said they were in no im
mediate danger.
The storm was downgraded from a tropical
storm to a tropical depression during the morning
when its maximum sustained wind eased to less
than 39 mph. By 10 a.m., that top wind speed was
down to 35 mph.
The storm was moving toward the north-north-
east and was expected to continue weakening as it
moved inland, the National Weather Service said.
sil u I
street from the stadium until the expansion is
completed in 1999.
Then they are to be moved to a new, larger,
tree-lined plaza with lights, just outside the
north end of the stadium. But the tunnel that
opened to the grave site would be filled in with
an elevator shaft leading to luxury sky boxes.
“I respect the leadership at Texas A&M for
their forthrightfulness in planning for a modern,
first-class facility,” said Robert Keathley, a retired
school teacher in Corsicana who graduated from
A&M in 1961 and comes from a prominent fam
ily of Aggie alums.
“But the case of the Reveille grave site and
tunnel view being traded for a large elevator
shaft to provide access to private apartment
sky boxes, is just too much of a violation of the
spirit of Aggieland.”
Keathley said he plans to form a group
called “Friends of Reveille” to keep the grave
site from being moved.
Said A&M Athletic Director Wally Groff:
“Nobody liked the idea of having to do it, but
it wasn’t practical to build around them so we
proceeded with the plan.
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Photograph: Rony Angkriwan
Scott Frandsen. a sales representative, demonstrates the retractable ladder of a fire truck
Oil U if f or John Kiracofe, assistant fire chief from Jollyville, in the Kyle Field parking lot Saturday.
GOP dissidents swayed by DeLay
. WASHINGTON (AP) — Going public
with their story, young Republicans dis
enchanted with Newt Gingrich said they
would not have tried to oust the House
speaker without a solid push from Rep.
Tom DeLay and other party leaders.
Despite the disaster that befell the at
tempt, however, the rebels appeared still
in an insurgent mood. They agreed Sun
day that Rep. Bill Paxon, who lost his
leadership position in the commotion’s
aftermath, would make a fine speaker.
Reps. Matt Salmon of Arizona and Joe
Scarborough of Llorida, conservatives from
the activist GOP class of 1994, told ABC’s
“This Week” that they both attended a pivotal
meeting July 10 where the move to remove
Gingrich was discussed.
Salmon said they
were swayed by a
clear-cut message
from DeLay of Texas,
as party whip the no. 3
Republican in the
House leadership, that
he would join them in
voting Gingrich out of
office. “I can tell you
unequivocally that the
17 members that were
in that room with Tom Delay had that
impression,” Salmon said.
Gingrich
Scarborough said on ABC and later on
CNN’s “Late Edition” that DeLay appeared
to have the backing of others in the GOP
leadership. He said, “The entire leadership
team was on board.”
The two lawmakers insisted that an
immediate uprising against Gingrich
was never their intention. “I think most
of us were in a wait-and-see mode” as
Republican leaders negotiated with the
White House on tax cuts and balancing
the budget, Salmon said. “We wanted to
see the speaker go in with full strength,”
he said.
Please see GOP on Page 2.
FBI finds new traces of Cunanan
Fugitive is prime suspect in Versace murder case
MIAMI BEACH, Lla. (AP) — Andrew Cuna
nan, already a most wanted fugitive by the LBI
now being sought in Gianni Versace’s killing,
used his real name and willingly left a
thumbprint at a pawnshop eight days before the
designer was gunned down.
The clerk at the pawnshop, Vivian Olivia, said
she followed Llorida law requiring her to mail a
receipt to Miami Beach Police for the gold coin
Cunanan pawned. The coin is believed to be
stolen from one of Cunanan’s prior victims.
It’s not clear whether police whether police re
ceived that receipt or what they did with it.
“There are four copies of (the sales receipt),”
Olivia told The Associated Press on Saturday.
“One I give to the customer, one I put in with
the coin, and the one with the fingerprint I give
to police.”
Cunanan also left a record of the name of the
hotel where he was staying and a room number
where he continued to live until the day before
the killing.
Olivia said records show the transaction took
place at 4:42 the afternoon of July 7. She told the
Sun-Sentinel of Port Lauderdale that she mailed
the receipt to police the next day.
She didn’t talk to police until the day after
Versace’s killing, when she called to tell them
about the receipt she still had. They came and
confiscated the fingerprint card and the coin,
which investigators said was stolen from Lee
Miglin, a Chicago developer Cunanan is
charged with killing.
Calls to the Miami Beach Police Department
and the LBI by the AP were not returned Sunday.
Cunanan, accused of shooting Versace on
Tuesday, is also the prime suspect of an an ex
lover and a former friend in Minnesota, Miglin
and a cemetery caretaker in New Jersey.
Even before the Versace slaying, the LBI was al
ready receiving reports of Cunanan sightings
from all corners of the country. Boarding air
planes. At a laundry in Oklahoma City. In the au
dience on the Geraldo Rivera show.
Now that his face is plastered on virtually every
storefront in south Llorida, the supposed Cuna
nan sightings are pouring in.
“There are just literally hundreds and hun
dreds and hundreds of sightings and bits of in
formation,” Miami Beach Police Chief Richard
Barreto told CBS’s Pace the Nation Sunday morn
ing. “So this is a daunting task.”
Episcopal bishop will resist
mandate for women clergy
PORT WORTH (AP) —The head of the
Episcopal Diocese of Port Worth said he
will resist compliance with a newly ap
proved canon requiring acceptance of
women as priests.
Bishop Jack Iker said he believes that
“radical feminists” influenced a vote at the
Episcopal General Convention in Philadel
phia on Saturday to make it mandatory for
him to accept female clergy.
“In the heart of radical feminism, there
is a lot of internal anger. I think we saw that
here,” Iker said after the 140-44vote in the
convention’s House of Bishops.
The church voted 21 years ago to or
dain women, but Iker and bishops in
Quincy, Ill.; San Joaquin, Calif., and Eau
Claire, Wis., have refused to do so.
The new policy will not force the
four to perform the ceremonies. How
ever, they must arrange for someone
else to ordain women and allow female
priests to serve in the diocese.
About 10 percent of the church’s
15,000 priests are women.
“History teaches us the oppressed be
come the oppressors,” Iker said. “Women
felt they were oppressed in the church.
Now they are getting the upper hand and
want to turn the tables.”
Advocates of women as priests in the
Lort Worth diocese say the oppression
continues under those such as Iker.
“We’ve had a tyranny going on in
the Diocese of Lort Worth for a long
time,” said Brenda Seaver of Lort
Worth, president of the Council of the
Laity, an independent group that sup
ports women as priests.
Iker, a conservative in the House of
Bishops, said he will send women to the
neighboring Dallas diocese for ordina.-
tion. Lort Worth parishes that ask for a
female priest would come under the
Dallas diocese’s oversight, he said.
That won’t be good enough, said
Katie Sherrod of Lort Worth, a board
member of the national Women’s Cau
cus of the Episcopal Church.
“It is unworkable, and it still relegates
women priests to second-class status in the
Diocese of Lort Worth,” she said last week.
Iker said he has no intentions of
splitting from the Episcopal Church
and will continue to work within a 2.1
million-member denomination.