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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Monday October 12,1987 Vol. 98,No.36
Published since 1889 by the students of the University of Kansas
(USPS 650-640)
Vacated barracks goes up in flames
Staff writer
By JAVAN OWENS
A fire that consumed a vacated prisoner-of-war barracks in East Lawrence last night took firefighters about an hour to control.
the barracks, which are in a wooded area near 118 Street and Haskell Avenue, went up in a blaze around 9 p.m. The fire did not spread to any surrounding vacated barracks.
But Lawrence firefighters had to take extra precautions because of carbon dioxide canisters contained in railroad cars nearby. Firefighters said that although the canisters were not flammable, they could explode from pressure.
Firefighters said that they didn't know what started the blaze but that the matter was under investigation. Officials interviewed two boys who had been playing near the area at the time of the fire.
The boys said they heard an explosion and then a scream. They said drifters often used the vacant barracks for shelter.
Fire Chief Jim McSwain said he wanted to make sure no one was inside the barracks before the blaze. Firefighters searched the area for remains but could not make a complete search. McSwain said fire fighters would resume the search at 7 a.m. today.
Four fire trucks and one ambulance were at the scene. Lawrence police assisted by blocking off nearby roads.
Lawrence firefighters battle a blaze at a vacated prisoner-of-war barracks near 11th Street and Haskell Avenue. The fire is under investigation.
Kansas' economy reviewed
By JORN E. KAALSTAD Staff writer
Staff writer
Kansas farms are most likely to thrive when they can compete in the international marketplace without the help of state subsidies and devaluation of the dollar, Wayne Angell, a governor of the Federal Reserve Board, said Friday.
"Protectionism is a form of disaster for the world and us," Angell said at the annual Economic Outlook Conference at the Kansas Union. "We are linked inevitably with the well-being of the world."
Angell was the keynote speaker at the conference, which was sponsored by the KU Institute for Public Policy and Business Research and several departments and organizations at KU and in Kansas.
Angell, 57, who holds a doctorate in economics from KU, is a former Ottawa University economics professor. He became a member of the National Reserve Board in February 1986. His term expires in January 1994.
The rise in the dollar's exchange rate, which peaked in 1985, may have contributed to the farm crisis, Angell said. Demand for farm products abroad decreased when they became too expensive for foreign buyers, he added.
A lot of people in Washington want to see the United States recover its
See ANGELL, p. 6, col.1
Staff writer
By MARK TILFORD
After sitting for roughly 30 years in a Miami garage, an irreplaceable 68,000-piece collection of preserved reptiles and amphibians from the West Indies has found a new home at the University of Kansas.
The collection, one of the most extensive in the world, was delivered Friday to the Museum of Natural History, Humphrey, director of the museum.
The specimens, curled up in jars and green garbage cans, were collected over a 30-year period by Albert Schwartz, a herpetologist and friend of William Duellman, curator of herpetology at KU's museum.
"In terms of neotropical collections of amphibians and reptiles, this puts us right on top of the heap." Humphrey said. "In terms of research, this fills an enormous gap in our neotropical collection."
Schwartz sold his collection to the University for $120,000, a bargain for students.
The collection includes species of
Duelman said he had no idea of the size and species of the largest or smallest creatures but said the colony was large enough to long and snakes 6- to 7-feet long.
snakes, lizards, iguanas, turtles and other reptiles.
The collection was paid for with money from the Kansas University Endowment Association and the University Duellman said.
Humphrey said that it could take three years to arrange storage for the collection and list it on a computer catalogue. Parts of the collection may be on display in the future, he said.
The collection represents about a 30 percent increase in the museum's collection of amphibians and reptiles.
"It probably weighed in the neighborhood of five tons." Humphrey
crys.
But the University doesn't expect to be overwhelmed in cataloguing its new acquisition. It will apply for a fellowship from the Foundation in Washington, D.C.
Time shows Hashinger's changes
By DAVID E. STEWART Special to the Kansan
Hashinger Hall residents Dawn Nettelhorst and Laura Way thought they had an original money-saving idea when early this semester they carpeted their room for free, using the Nettelhorst found in a Chicago carret store.
But economy-minded students lived in Hashinger even when it first opened 25 years ago. That, however, may be one of the few things that residents today have in common with residents then.
Joyce Mitchell and her roommate, Joanne Randall, made the newspapers in 1921 when they covered their house built floor with carpet samples.
"Carpet wasn't in our budget," said Mitchell, who is now Joyce Salisbury. "It was like a patchwork quilt — two pieces were alike."
Salisbury, a Kansas City, Kan., schoolteacher, lived in Hashinger in 1962 and 1963, while she studied music education at KU. Although Hashinger is now coed, it was then a women-only hall.
According to a 1962 University Daily Kansan article, going coed at
that time would have meant installing a physical barrier dividing the hall in half. When Hasinger went coed in 1972, the sexes lived on different floors. Now, the sexes are split by wing.
Caryl Smith, associate vice chancellor for student affairs and dean of student life, was resident director of Hashinger in 1962 and was involved with Hashinger again in 1972, while she was dean of women.
"1962 was a growth time for the University." Smith said. "When Hashinger opened, we had a chance to decide how to do things differently."
At that time most women's halls had a midnight curfew, Smith said. After midnight, the hall would be locked, and no one was allowed in or out. But Hashinger had a "senior key" program. Senior women could check out keys to the front doors and could stay out as long as they wished.
Salisbury said she came back to visit Hashinger in 1977 and may come back this year if there is a 25th-year reunion.
No official plans exist for a reunion of original residents because the effort involved in finding all of them
But, she said. "We'll probably have some kind of party in the spring."
would be too much for the staff to handle, said Ann Isley, resident director at Hashinger.
Salisbury said she was interested in visiting the hall to see improvements such as Hashinger's music room, painting room and dance floor.
Those rooms were added to the hall in 1972, when Hashinger became the Residence Center for the Creative Arts.
"All we had were a couple of black-and-white TVs and a few sofas in the lounges," Salisbury said. "The hall was pretty plain and quiet. We loved it, even if we sat on the window, and we had to sneak in our coffee pot and popcorn popper."
Phone service was quite plain, too. This year, Hashinger's phones became part of a campus system that offers call waiting, automatic recall and three-way calling. But in 1962 phones were not even in students' rooms. That improvement came 10 years later.
"We only had one phone out in the hall," Salisbury said. "Whoever answered it would have to scream for
you when you got a call."
Instead of phones, each room had an intercom connected to a switchboard at the front desk. Smith said he used the part in showing KU spirit in 1962.
"When KU would win a football game, Templin, Lewis and Hashinger would display the score using the lights in their windows." Smith said. "The switchboard operator would use the intercoms to tell students if their lights should be on or off."
The scoreboard effect usually would slow traffic on Iowa Street, Smith said.
A major complaint about hall life in 1962 was the food quality. "It was bad," Salisbury said. "Most nights we had hamburger patties and, of course, fish on Fridays. But they never served pizza or tacos."
So she would often do what today's students do — order a pizza. "It wasn't as quick, then, though," she said, usually had to wait about two hours.
Despite the lack of conventions that most students take for granted these days, Salisbury said. "It was hard to believe," she added, "didn't mind. It was a place to stay."
Architecture students learn from wheelchairs
By MARK TILFORD
Staff writer
Nothing could be easier than a casual walk from Marvin Hall to Watson Library and back.
And nothing could be more fru-
cious than that same trip in a whirlpool.
That's what second-year architecture students are finding out today as they spend time on campus seeing how others live.
Monday Morning
"We're trying to get a grasp on how the handicapped deal with stairs, doors and other obstacles," said Ken Menke. St. Louis sophomore, during a two-hour tour of campus on Friday, the first day of the exercise.
The project was organized by Alpha Rho Chi, the professional architecture fraternity, to give second-year students a better idea of what some of their fellow students encounter on campus.
He got the inspiration, he said, from an experience he had with Greg Boadlin, Derby senior, who was confined to a wheelchair after being injured in a sledding accident two years ago behind Ellsworth Hall.
"This whole mess is my idea," said Matty Forman. Endowed with seni-
dering ability, he is a master.
On Friday morning, though, a group of nine students could only think about the few feet.
The students will use what they have learned to work on future architecture projects.
Greg and I were books in the Kansas Union," Forman said. "The only way he could get up and down was in a freight elevator."
We're trying to get a grasp on how the handicapped deal with stairs, doors and other obstacles.'
"Hey, I'm cute, someone will come
- Ken Menke
St. Louis sophomore
along and open it for me," said Linda Cornett, Norfolk, Neb., sophomore, as she struggled to open a door at Lindley Hall.
"I've experienced a few of them," Tom Weisel, Lawrence senior in architecture said of the schools.
Forman said he got the wheelchairs from contacts through friends. Some came from Independence Inc., a Lawrence support service for the handicapped, and King Pharmacy, 1112 W. 6th St.
Weisel should know. He is in a wheelchair.
Though it had a sober theme, the tour was not without laughs.
“This building smells bad,” said Jim Malench, Edwardsville, III., senior, as he walked alongside Forman through Lindley Hall.
"It's engineers," Forman explained.
Lindley presented one of many obstacles the students encountered on the way.
"That's neat, you make a mess," Forman said as he struggled to drink from a too-high water fountain.
Most buildings on campus have been made accessible to students in wheelchairs. Weisel said. He said the university's library, Watson Library were good examples.
The library at the Spencer Museum of Art is accessible only by a freight elevator for someone in a wheelchair. The elevator, Weisel said, can be operated only by a security guard with a key.
But there are frustrating exceptions, he said.
But the most frustrating obstacle is the least noticeable for anyone not in a wheelchair.
Most of the sidewalks on campus slope ever so slightly to a peak in the middle, to allow water to drain off, Weisel said. The slope forces wheel-horns there to constantly adjust their direction or see the chair roll off the sidewalk.
"I can't think of any sidewalks that aren't sloped." Weisel said.
Explaining to the group how his specially equipped van works and the problems he experiences with other men, Weisel seemed to sum up the morning.
"It's kind of sad, but that's the way it goes."
Lisa Jones/KANSAN
A simple street curb becomes a major obstacle for Tim Vaughn, St. Louis sophomore, during a two-hour tour of campus in a wheelchair. Matt Fawtin, Endwell, N.Y., senior, helps a helping hand. Forman organized a wheelchair tour Friday to help second-year architecture students understand the importance of designing accessible structures for the physically disabled. Tour will continue today.