October 30, 1969 Shelton Mason County Journal | ![]() |
©
Shelton Mason County Journal. All rights reserved. Upgrade to access Premium Tools
PAGE 4 (4 of 26 available) PREVIOUS NEXT Jumbo Image Save To Scrapbook Set Notifiers PDF JPG
October 30, 1969 |
|
Website © 2025. All content copyrighted. Copyright Information Terms Of Use | Privacy Policy | Request Content Removal | About / FAQ | Get Acrobat Reader ![]() |
Editorials:
Tuesday is D-Day
The fate of Shelton School District's Iong-ranme building
program is now in the hands of the district's voters.
The $3,100,000 bond issue for a new high school on next
Tuesday's ballot is the key portion of that program.
It will unlock the door to a new era in Shelton's
educational system, providing the means to break the pattern
which has crowded nearly all of the district's students into a
small downtown area.
The plan is a good one and seems to have the support of a
majority of the voters. The soundness of the proposal is
evident in the lack of organized opposition to it. There will
be those who will cast negative votes, but it would appear
that most citizens realize the time has come to take this
important step in the growth of their schools.
Many individuals and groups have worked to assure its
approval. The Journal has attempted, during the past several
years, to outline the need for each step in the long-range
building program so that voters would understand its
importance before going to the polls.
The time has now arrived for the big decision. Tuesday is
D-Day for Shelton's schools. We believe that the district's
voters will approve this phase of the building program as they
. =,__
By STEVE ERICKSON
It had been a long time since I thought much about Tim.
Since anybody had, I suspect.
Nine years, in my case. But there was his name again, last
week, listed number 2 on the weekly circuit court
arraignment list.
Thf charge was armed robbery.
Tim was just a kid - albeit a tough-talking kid - when I
knew him. He lived, more or less alone, in a house next door
to wife's grandparents.
In those days, he seemed to evoke maternal feelings in
women, with the possible exception of his mother.
He was a nice-looking boy of 14 who hung around a lot,
because he
Sometimes I'd bump into himas I entered tlt4 y
Tavern for a beer. He'd be in his parents' car, outside, waiting
for them to come out. Usually, he'd been there for hours.
Once he accompanied wife and I to Lake Quinault, where
he showed off for us by stealing a bag of carmel corn from a
ma-and-pa grocery store.
It was about that time that Tim's formal education
abruptly ended. He slugged a member of his junior high
school faculty in the school auditorium, and was expelled. He
never went back.
And now, armed robbery. I borrowed Tim's file from the
district attorney and browsed through it.
Tim and three other men were accused of offering a ride
to a young hitchhiker, then robbing him at pistol-point.
The robbery grossed $21.
I attended arraignments to see Tim. I guess I expected to
see a likeable, tough-talking 14-year-old boy.
Most of the boy was gone. Tim is 23 now, a pale, sturdy,
yet gaunt young man whose eyes dart restlessly around places
like jails and courtrooms. Little of the youthful cockiness is
left visible through a hard, brittle shell.
I tried to catch his eye. It took a while and quite a bit of
staring, but eventually his stacatto gaz e flashed across mine.
Did he recognize me through the haze of years, I
wondered? Maybe. It was difficult to be sure. Nothing
seemed to register with him, but maybe he had quit letting
things register years before, in the parking lot of the Parkway
Tavern, or the Wigwam, or the Cozy or even the Sailor's Rest.
What if he HAD recognized me? I tried to imagine how
that would be for him. Everyone else always seems so
damned NORMAL at such times. I suppose I appeared that
way to Tim now.
The judge called Tim up and Tim pleaded not guilty in a
voice that had dropped an octave since 1960. Then Tim was
returned to the county jail to await developments.
I talked to his lawyer.
"What kind of guy is he?" I asked.
"A narco," the lawyer said. LeBalese for a narcotics
addict.
"What kind?" I asked. "For how long?"
He consulted his file on Tim. "Seven years. He's tried
everything."
Seven years ago Tim was 16 years old, an age when you
and 1 worried about easing through plane geometry with
passing grades.
"What happens now?" I asked.
"Oh," the lawyer said, stretching and slapping Tim's file
shut, "I think we'll be able to get him into a federal narcotics
rehabilitation program."
That seemed to take care of that. I left the courtroom
then, leaving the lawyer to think of other clients, other
kids-gone-wrong, other places he'd rather be on this Indian
summer day.
Who wants to spend his time brooding about a castaway
kid who has to u drugs to bend the world into a nice place
to live?
A narco. Punk. Junkie.
It will be a long time before anyone thinks of Tim again,
I suppose. And if they do, it won't be as a nice-looking young
kid pathetically trying to impress an indifferent world. It wtll
be as an unwanted mirror of their own ignosance snd guilt.
And who wants to think about that?
l
0
0
O
Subsequent to the public
meeting held last night at the
Evergreen School Auditorium,
relative to the drug problem in
our community, I would like to
submit the following
observations.
Since society has decreed
certain drugs are not conducive to
the public welfare, the law
enforcement agencies are pledged
to apprehend and bring to justice
those who violate this law. Here,
again, I would like to emphasize
- "apprehend and bring to
justice." The responsibility of the
peace officer ceases when the case
is presented to the courts, as the
penalty is determined by the
judge.
Our problem now is to seek
out and bring to justice those who
would traffic in this menace.
Because of the individual rights
set forth in the Constitution and
interpreted by the courts, our law
.Letter box: ,
Chief needs help
Editor, The Journal:
uPfleers
111
are hampe, o,.
fulfillment of their duffties. .j
As this is such a secretive P
insidious menace, all of M0
Dad and youngsters, nat be:.
involved. By this, l y+%O
and active assistance ,_,
officers. If anyone has knOWt
of, or is'witnesS t°;
misdemeanor, report it P';
willin to assist in its t il
g --.£e "
disposition. All too I,,_+,, eq
• " on't ltletv-
the feehng, d .... ,at tO
name", or, "I dent 1
• become involved • T ..,a
involved; it is reaching into *'"
home.
As commissioner
safety for the City of
have taken an oath
society and fully intend
this responsibility
assistance of
Department, and,
citizens.
FRANK RAINS
Chief of Police
City of Shelton
measure to assess property on the
basis of current use, which was
made possible by a constitutional
amendment approved in 1968.
Earlier plans to split the
measure into two parts have been
abandoned. Except for an
increase in penalties, it will
r6tain the same form in which it
passed the House last session,
old, in need of extensive and
expensive remodeling and is still
remote from other school district
buildings.
It needs to be replaced and
relocated. The retarded youngsters
and their parents and teachers are
entitled to and deserve new
modern classroom facilities in a
location beneficial to all involved.
If the school is to be replaced
the violence that follows, he is only to die in the Senate Ways
lucky to escape with his life. What and Means Committee. and relocated, and nobody doubts your support.
-':s + " cea " "n "-" the need, now is the most ::+;"ql
gives the novel strength is the low, .. i_ cnan ,_at o_t .pas_ 8tn -pportune and advantageous time .ii'
low key in which the story is told. ume aren( o tei nan 3u-zu.
`RlHWuuHulluMmmHmHM Ilil7
Don't argue with wrong-way driver
By FRED OSMERS
A couple of newspaper stories in recent weeks, concerning
motorists traveling the wrong way down the freeway lanes,
gave us pause to consider what we, as motorists, could do if
we should see another car coming toward us on the freeway
in our lanes.
We thought of several solutions: We could drive onto the
shoulder, get in the farthest lane away from the oncoming
car, pull off the freeway and sit there until he goes past, or
simply abandon the car and run for cover (not very smart
from several different standpoints).
What really worried us as we thought about it, was trying
to deterdne the psychological makeup of the person coming
toward us. Anyone who does manage to get into a wrongway
situation on the Freeway obviously is in no condition to be
driving at all. He may be emotionally upset, drunk or on
drugs or what have you.
Consequently, the mere fact that he's there, in the wrong
lanes, going the wrong way poses the question of whether or
not he can act rationally at all. Therefore, we can't rely on
knows for sure what 'way' that is?).
The Patrol experience has been that
generally are under the influence of drugs or
They usually are by themselves, 1
they are doing something wrong or, as the t
"realize they are not doing the job right."
But they cannot determine what they are
Consequently, they want to avoid suspicion or
so, they move into their right lane of tra file
which actually is YOUR fast-moving left lane
as you go southbound at 70 mph in the left
northbound in "his" right hand,
Cardinal rule number one is DON'T
YOURSELF, the WSP warns. Don't trY
oncoming car or in any way try to physically
as far away from him (laterally) as you can
lights, honk your horn, but get out of his waY.
Don't try to pursue him. Even the
ordinarily pursue a wrong-way driver.
him to realize suddenly what he's doing, and quietly pull off far enough ahead of him, turn on their
ope to catch him there i "
h "
the road and turn around. • -rely :!
:o +at :o o ,o '
Wh3ac:sP a:::,;o:caYOUmamk?no ictionUjUd t=nghdotO? a rnYknrS,iwsPtotii:m!!tawefre:y!!i+. ,
pred" " . " i , leit
predictable case. We talked with the Washington State Patrol how long ago you passed him. They 11 hand .l
on this and while the trooper tried to be helpful, we . Meeting a car coming toward you in your l".
understood his reluctance to pinpoint a definite action other norrendo _us experience but your best chance r qlCpl " lll
,, , ,, look o i" +
than getting out of the oncoming cars way (and who ut for yourself In'st: keep cool and S e "'+!/i :
|llmlll|lllllulllllR|ll|mlll|||H|m|lmnm|llu|m|ml|l||l|||HHHuR§| " l|
..... man n. After he has died he wil!
J ] • It I II
age 4. Shelton-Mason County Journal - Thursday, October 30, 1969
By LLOYD A. COOK
THE POSEIDON
ADVENTURE. By Paul Gallico,
Coward-McCann, 1969. The
Poseidon, an old luxury liner, is
on her way home, South America
to Lisbon. Off the Azores she is
hit by a massive seismic wave,
coming from s quake a mile
down, and is capsized. Among her
several hundred passengers and
crew, only a few survive. The
novel is about the efforts of these
few to climb the great upside
I down ship, get to the hull topside,
and hope for rescue.
The survivors are a mixed lot
- young and old, male and
female, those who dare and those
afraid. The water level is rising,
fires break out everywhere, bodies
and debris all around.
The effects of panic on
people, its role and bringing out
the best and worst, is nowhere
better depicted than in this novel.
I have long admired Galileo for
his imaginative yarns such as THE
SNOW GOOSE. I applaud him
now for his cool realism, his calm
perceptive writing.
A TIME TOO SOON. By
Edward Lindall, Morrow, 1967.
Here is an older one, a raw
shocker, well worth reading. The
setting is New Guinea, the action
between four whites and many
blacks in the outback. The time is
"too soon" for the independence
of that small, wild country.
One white man is district
officer, the other a plantation
manager. Wives are friends but
m_ce one has slept with
the other's husband. There s
rising unrest among the natives,
followed by hit-run attacks on the
forced-up whites. The officer, a
proper sahib, is off in pursuit of a
marauding band. He is ambushed,
his men are killed, his head is
crushed. The other whites are
taken captive and made to witness
a shattering spectacle.
• Natives have found in their
midst a young black Christ, an
eight year old, and they proceed
to crucify him in the biblical
(they_ believe) join God in heaven
and bring them all good things.
It helps here if one has read
some anthropology Boas,
Levy-Bruhl, Malinowski - to
realize that all of this could have
happened, to sense the logic of
the preliterate mind. The tale is
not for the squeamish.
The book is Suzanne Blanc
THE SEA TROLL, Doubleday,
1969. After two typhoons, the
old freighter limps into Hung
Kong. With repairs made, freight
and passengers aboard, she sets
out for Singapore.
Capt. Haugen has had a rough
night in port. He remembers being
drunk, picking up a woman,
killing her because she reminded
him of Elise, his wife. What bugs
him most is his feeling that Elise
has been unfaithful, that the man
if Rolf his chief officer. Still
unsteady on his feet, he showers,
dresses, and goes to look for Cory
Reynolds. He has decided to
comfort her on the trip.
The theme is the mental
collapse of the captain, including
an attempt to murder Cory for
she toc resembled his wife.
David St. John, THE
MONGOL MASK, Weybright &
TaUey, 1969. Word has come to
the CIA that the Chinese have a
missile base at Ling-Nor, deep in
the Gobi Desert. Pete Ward's job
is to find out for certain. He is to
fly to Hong Kong, then make his
way as best he can. Chances of
getting in are poor; of getting out,
zero.
Appeal of the book is not the
effort to plant Red agents as
Pete's contacts, or to seduce him
by use of pretty Commie girls or,
as he drew near Ling-Nor, to
murder him, for all are pat ploys
in spy tales. Appeal lies in what
Red China is like - its riots,
purges, hunger, chaos, and greed.
The author was for 20 yearsa
CIA man.
In P. M. Hubbard's COLD
WATER, Antheneum 1969,
Gifford, the non-hero, is hired by
a stranger to live on a remote
island on a British lake owned by
the latter, to run a boat to and
from the mainland. The place is
spooky, even menacing,, from
the first. There is a big stone
house and, behind that, a
tremendous power plant, but for
what? Gifford, a timid man
except with Fifi the maid and
Mrs. Callender, sets out to
uncover what it all is about. In
Let's talk books:
Donger on'd suspense, o potpourri
anybody except Gov. Dan Evans
thinks it is necessary.
The key issue, however, will
be the same as any other session
- money. To avert a $5 3 million
projected general fund deficit
without raising taxes, a lot of
juggling will be required.
Anticipated savings to be
effective by the governor's
directive for a cutback in
spending will have to be
reappropriated to areas which
now face a shortage of funds.
lening up the
bill which was passed by
the 1969 session, and opening up
the budget is like cutting the draw
string, on a grab bag. School
teachers, who already are seeking
another pay raise on top of the 4
per cent voted for next year, will
the latter may have to settle for
self-help legislation.
And The Deep, Blue Sea
The legislators will be trapped
between the deep, blue sea of a
general fund deficit much larger
than that already projected, or
enacting another tax increase,
which in an election year could
represent an excellent facsimile of
the devil to most law-makers.
It isn't any wonder most
legislators wish the governor
would let them stay home next
year.
,: They can ',oid opening up
the general budget bill, of course,
by putting what is needed in the
supplemental budget. This is a
measure which died in limbo with
adjournment of the 1969 session.
It includes many small
appropriations to +settle claims
This could be one of the rare
occasions when the legislators
could be more fearful of raising
taxes than of the pressures which
are exerted for more spending.
The governor favors holding the
line on speeding,and has indicated
he will cooperate.
The real pressures haven't
started to really build up,
however, and when they do, it
won't be easy. If the law-makers
are able to hold the session to 21
to 30 days as most of them hope,
they might be able to kAep
control of tile"purse strings. ';q q
But if the session runs too
long, it is likely to break wide
open. If it does, it will be a case
of hang on to your hats; here we
go again.
But if the law-makers go on a
following the regular, the
Legislature passed a budget bill
without providing the necessary i00le / d
revenue; then sent a committee to "Yes" vote u
notify the governor it was ready
to adjourn.
The message which the Editor, The Journal: to proceed with
committee brought back was Rogers School was established do so. Here is whY.
short buttothepoint: over fourteen years ago as a 4th, there will be
"The governor sends his temporary public school facility the voters in
respects and says he w!see yOU , to house the mentally retarded 309, a bond
• Monday. ' , .... ' ,,, ....... • .,"
L children m Mason County. The . the coffstruq li
The law-makers got the classrooms were set up in old four-year high
message. Back for a second special Navy barracks which were Included in that
session, they finished the job in remodeled to accommodate the sum which will
just 11 days. youngsters. The school is located for construction
At this point, the legislators adjacent to the Shelton airport house the
have only three tax measures in and is still leased from the Port classes now he
Commission. School.
mind, and only one of these
would help the state general fund. After all these years, Rogers Should the issue be e
This is a tax on steam-powered School is still at that same it is ex acted that state
electrical generating plants, location and still in outmoded be avaiPble to offsetL
Another measure on the and makeshift facilities. Rogers of the cost. If tide '
agenda would reduce revenue School has provided a place for successfully suPp°rtffes
somewhat rather than increase it, instruction of the retarded, and it may be several " I
though most of its impact would has served that purpose quite well another opportt'it'o
r variable to replace " -,
be at the county level. This is the over the years, but the building is :n th n only at s €0
d e - -tit
sacrifice in cost bu ..td
standpoint of cost es..
• - of state "+
posmble loss ,, ,,-^f et
It behooves an.tel
parents, teachers, cit, 0 la
all that is po.ble.t,
the bond issue ts'lter "
Mason County t;_dtti
Washington A ss<
Retarded children +
difference, colleges are ready to dip in, and bill. whip hand. If the law-makers recommended a bond issue be
appropriate in excess of revenue, placed on the ballot Tuesday,
The difference is that hardly so are cities and towns, though Gun-shy On Taxes then adjourn, the governor can November 4th. The reason for the
call them back again. Citizen's recommendation is that
This has been done before, all factors, including both the
Former Guy. Arthur B. Langlie
did it in 1951. In a special session percent of State building aid for
did the first two steps, additional classrooms at Bordeaux and
Mt. View elementary schools. The time is
There is one mishap however, that could send the now
Shelton School District alld .,
program down the drain. That is an insufficient turnout to "She wantp e to know if the Red Chinese will Editor, The Journal: financial participation, .ire iI+: :-t .aJ
meet the legal requirement of forty percent of those casting using flaming arrows." The Shelton School Board is
ballots in the last general election, asking the support of all members all-time high. Since thiS c,o"-ts-'eti[ ,.
It would be a tragedy if the new high school were lost by of the community in passing the and building costs are ,, Etf
default, bond issue for a new high school rising, we believe there, W+l 101Lql0"
and .classrooms for the be a more econoiC..]l 111
Capitol dome: handicapped children of Shelton the taxpayers to Outto
on November 4th. The need for school. -'llle t° .lllP;
lhe Fiapdoodler" Legislators to battle over (surprisel) money This istherighttet0.l '"
secondary facilities for our fryk. ,''=
ever-expanding high school all of our students tl
From ..... caramel €0r population and to replace out-elementary, juni°rlthth p s
moded buildings is imperative at school buildings. Wi of 0urYle
By ROBERT C. CUMMINGS be after more money, against the state and must be spending spree, the governor will this time. of this bond issue all
The 1970 special session of If the school teachers get it, passed. Opening up this bill to insist that they provide the Your school board has studied people will be well housed facTO
armed roLLer--oo y the Legislature will be different state employees-will be after general appropriations, however, additional taxes to raise the building problems over the past number of years. -ollS J '[II.1
to from others in one respect, but more, too. Some segments of could be just as catastrophic as money, several years and the Citizen's BOARD OF DIRECI ,, KtE4
. ,ua
there seems to be only one major higher education and community opening up the general budget On this the governor holds the Advisory Council recently Shelton School DiSt-ri,,' T 1
HERBERT L. HERGtm ' |illl'_.
Chairman .... a tel
RICHARD C. BRw ....
ERNEST HAML --, + (
DOUGLAS m. LAg- Or aS
THOMAS R. WESTOr ' RI
r'++