Monday, Nov. 11, 1985
Campus/Area
University Daily Kansan
7
Ched DeShazo/KANSAN
Cynthia Trabach, Lawrence graduate student, helps her daughter, Shawna, out of a carriage at 11th and Massachusetts streets. The $5 rides were offered yesterday by Mel Garrett Jr., Kansas City, Mo., driver and owner of the carriage.
Carriage attracts attention
When Mel Garrett Jr's children were young, he to give to them rides on Shetland ponies. Now that his children are grown, he dons a black top hat and cape and gives rides to strangers in a replica 17th-century horse-drawn carriage
By Theresa Scott Of the Kansan staff
Garrett let his horses clip-clip through downtown Lawrence yesterday, pulling his carriage filled with smiling children and adults, as a promotion for business in the downtown area.
"It was really fun," said Peggy Johnson, Route 6, after she and her two children, Kristy, 5, and Scott, 4 climbed down from the carriage. "You get to see everybody and everybody waves."
The 15-minute carriage rides, which began at Watkin Park, 11th and Massachusetts streets, were sponsored by the Downtown Lawrence Association to attract shoppers to the area and to encourage downtown merchants to remain open on Sundays, said Susan Cairns, DLA president and owner of the Yarn Barn, 918 Massachusetts St.
"We are trying to encourage
Thunder and Apollo, the two horses pulling the carriage, picked up their passengers at the park and carried them west on 11th Street, north on Vermont Street, east on Seventh Street and south on Massachusetts Street, dropping them off where they started. Unless, of course, they wanted to be dropped off somewhere else.
For $5, as many as four people could go for a ride, complete with hot apple cider served at the park and wool blankets provided in the carriage.
Megan Hughes, Lawrence freshman, sold tickets for the rides. She said that sometimes people didn't complete their rides.
businesses to stay open on Sundays," Cairns said. "This is a fun way to promote downtown and to give families and/or dates something different to do."
The carriage will be downtown again Nov. 17 and Dec. 1 and 15 to cart passengers from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Cairns said that Thursday nights also might be added to the schedule
"There were two ladies who wanted a ride to work, so she dropped me."
waiting list for rides at 3:30 p.m., Cairns said she was disappointed at the number of people who had shown up.
"I was a little disappointed at the turnout," she said. "But you expect that with something that's just starting. Everybody waves at the carriage, so at least they're taking notice."
Calira said the idea of giving carriage rides in Lawrence was an off-shoot from the carriage rides that were given on the County Club Plaza, Kansas City, Mo.
"We have just one (carriage)," she said. "If it picks up, we might consider getting more than one next year."
Although there was a 30-minute
Garrett said that although he had not kept track of how many rides he had given, he thought business was all right for the first day.
He has been using his horses and carriage for 16 years at weddings, anniversaries, parades and parties, but said it was only a bobbie for him.
"In the 1800s, this was our forefathers' transportation to and from where they wanted to go," he said, patting the side of his maroon, gold and black carriage. "Rich folks used this type of deal.
Fraternity celebrates last payment in fiery fashion
Kevin Kombrink, president of the ATO Building Corp., proudly held up the flaming mortgage as it lit the ATO living room. About 150 alumni and relatives cheered and applauded.
The mortgage curled and blackened. Kombrink dropped the ashes in a tin tray.
ATO made its final payment on the $180,000
By Bengt Ljung Of the Kansan staff
Alpha Tau Omega fraternity saw its debt go up in smoke Saturday morning.
mortgage from 1965 on Oct. 1. The fraternity borrowed the money from its national fraternity organization to build a wing to its house at 1537 Tennessee SL. to double its capacity to 96 residents.
"It's nice to own your own house," Kombrink said. "We're free and clean. It's a real town."
"Now we can channel funds in the direction of renovating the house."
David Hoees, ATO president, said the survival of the house had been in doubt in the early 1970s. At that time, fraternity living
was unpopular and the house had difficulties making its payments.
"The house almost went under." Hosee said. "They were down to 55 people living here. But then they got a very good group of people and managed to turn it around.
"After that, there haven't been any problems."
There aren't many fraternities that still have mortgages to pay, Hoose said. They have either kept the same houses or moved to other houses when the demand increased. ATO had the opportunity to build the
southern wing when a house next door burned down.
Konbrink said KU's chancellor in 1965. Clark Wescoe, who is an ATO alumnus, helped to obtain the mortgage.
"The chancellor wanted the biggest and the best for his old fraternity." Kombrink said. "ATO here at KU is very large.
The number of members who live in the house make it one of the five largest fraternities in the country, he said.
Although the yearly mortgage payments of $40,000 have, come exclusively from the
residents, they should not expect a break on their rent now, Kombrink said. The excess money now will be used for a renovation of the house.
The house was built in 1940. The house structure is sound, Kombrink said, but ATO plans to renovate the inside in three or four years.
"We want to take the walls down and redesign the whole house inside to make more efficient use of the house," he said.
Kombrink said he hadn't decided what to do with the ashes of the mortgage.
535 Gateway Dr. 842-4966
KANSAS' FREEWAY SINGLES CLUB OFFERS A SMOOTH WAY TO GET YOUR LOVE LIFE IN GEAR
Surely it happened to you, and you've seen it happen to others. You're driving down the street at rush hour and in the lane next to you sits that speeding car.
The rest of the way down the street, you make dam sure that person doesn't leave your eyesight and you even try to navigate your way into a position where you can pull alongside that car at the next light. You exchange a few innocent glances and then ... ZOOM!¹ the person turns left never to be seen again.
"That's what happened to a California woman who saw her 'Prince Charming' disappear forever in a yellow Cadillac several years ago. I tat woman, Ruth Gulloude, whom she called on she called the Freeway Singles Club, an organization whose single members after numbered stickers on the backs of their cars signifying them as single and available."
The process is simple enough. To join members pay annual缴. That entitles them to a numbered decal that is attached to the rear window of the car.
When a member is spotted by an interested member, the spotter jumps down the number and mails a letter with that number on the outside of the envelope to the Freeway Singles Club. The Club takes the number and matches it with the address of the person owning that number and mails the letter sent by the spotter.
To get things rolling in the Lawrence area we are offering regular $35 memberships for only $5 to the first 50 applicants.
Kansas University Representatives needed.
REPRINTS FROM COLOR NEGATIVES ONLY 15C EACH
NOV. 11-15 ONLY