10
Wednesday, July 20,1994
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Red Lyon Tavern
A touch of Irish in
downtown Lawrence
944 Mass. 832-8228
SUMMER TRAVEL
*Lowest air fares to get you home.
*Lowest possible rates to Europe
Make Plans Now!
Engineers' efforts lost in space shuffle
*Eurail, Britrail passes
*World wide travel information
On campus location in the Kansas Union and 831 Mass.
Apollo 11 designers reflect on promises progress of program
The Associated Press
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — Twenty-five years later,
there is still pride in the voices of the engineers
whose colossal rocket hurled Apollo 11 to the moon.
But there is also disappointment over unfulfilled dreams and a tinge of bitterness over the way history has remembered the role of the rocket builders in that greatest of adventures.
It was a Saturn 5 developed at NASA laboratories in Huntsville that carried Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins into space in 1969. Twenty-five years ago today, Armstrong and Aldrin became the first humans on the
Back at the Marshall Space Flight Center, rocket designers had the next target in their sights before Apollo 11 had even returned to Earth.
moon.
"First, back to the moon on a permanent basis and then on to Mars," recalled Georg von Tiesenhausen. "We worked on that quite intensely. We figured out how to do it."
Five more trips to the moon were completed after Antoile 11, but no lunar base. No Mars.
"It's not only disappointing, I have the feeling we have actually stepped backward," said the 80-year-old von Tiesenhausen, whose work included developing the ground assembly that held down the rocket before launch.
The Apollo program gave way to Skylab, the space shuttle and seemingly endless work on a permanent space station.
"It's always astronauts, astronauts, astronauts," he said. "I guess the only thing we ever clashed with the astronauts on was publicity. They had 99.99 percent of it, and everybody else had the rest."
Then the anniversaries began. New books and documentaries have accompanied each anniversary, focusing mainly on the men who
James was bothered by the lack of attention paid to the white-shirted engineers who used slide rules, old-fashioned drawing tables and 60-hour work weeks to design a rocket capable of delivering 7.5 million pounds of thrust on lifoff.
The only Marshall engineer given more than passing mention is Wernher von Braun. He led the team of German rocket scientists who developed not only the Saturn but the Mercury Redstone that made Alan Shepard the first American in space in 1961.
Saturn 5 project manager Lee James gave an armchair review of a moon show that aired just last week.
"I'm still amazed by the size of the monster we created," said James, who retired from NASA shortly after the shuttle program began.
flew the rockets.
There never was a major problem with the Sat- rurn rocket during a launch. The huge white-and black rocket with some 3 million parts never failed, not even during a test.
Everyone else at Marshall toiled in virtual anonymity, but that was the way Leland Belew liked it.
James and the other retirees once stood at the middle of the universe when it came to rockets. Nowadays, they are at the fringes.
The idea of astronauts circling the globe in a 13-year-old space shuttle containing technology from the 1960s is hard to swallow for men who built a moon rocket from scratch in less than a decade.
"The major spotlight was when there was a major problem," said Beele, who was in charge of the Saturn 5 engines.
"I just wonder if the world realizes now amazing that is," James said.
"I'm not as satisfied as I should be," Belew said,
"but there have been great things done."
Gate-crashers, beware: Woodstock patrol awaits
The Associated Press
SAUGERTIES, N.Y. — Organizers of Woodstock '94 are taking extraordinary precautions to prevent waves of people from crashing the gates as they did in '69.
They may be swimming against a very strong tide.
"There will be like 10 million people trying to get in," said Dunn Eggink, a 14-year-old Woodstock resident who doesn't want to buy a ticket to the Aug. 12-14 show. "And I'm going to be leading them."
Even a fraction of that number worries officials. The original Woodstock wasn't a free concert but quickly became one when thousands streamed past overwhelmed security personnel, who simply gave up trying to collect tickets.
Promoters are trying to sell 250,000 tickets to the reunion concert on a farm in Saugerties, about two hours north of New York City.
“It’s the pilgrimage mentality — Come and it will be a free concert. But that was 25 years ago,” said State Police Capt. Gregory Sitler, in charge of the force's Woodstock detail.
At this year's concert, promoters will not allow anyone to enter on foot and are not selling tickets at the gate. Fans will be taken to the show from distant parking lots in shuttle buses.
Police will set up a traffic perimeter about two miles outside the concert site. Only local residents with permits and authorized vehicles will be allowed in.
Virtually every tow truck operator in the area has
been enlisted to remove cars abandoned by fans who try to reach the concert on foot. There's room to impound 1,000 cars. Owners will have to pay about $100 to retrieve them.
Police, many of them on all-terrain vehicles or horseback, will patrol outside fences surrounding the site. A security force of 1,000 will be watching from the inside.
Contingency plans for mass arrests are in place, with buses and state prisons ready.
"Nobody wants to do all that," Sitter said. "What you want to impress upon people is, 'Hey, you're not welcome here. This is not a place to come up and hang out.'"
No one can say how many people will try to crash the gates, but there are indications a lot of people are at least considering it.
Jeremiah Mountford, a 16-year-old Woodstock resident, said he had recently visited friends on Long Island. None of them had bought tickets, but many were planning to come anyway, he said.
"There's going to be so many people there, they're just going to have to let everyone in," he said.
An informal survey conducted recently by Woodstock Online, a computer network spreading information about the festival, found that 61 of 154 people planned to come to the area without a ticket, said Peter Walter, the network's operator.
Fans of the Grateful Dead have also been spreading fliers urging friends to show up without tickets, he said. The Dead are not scheduled to perform.
Downtown merchants brace for sidewalk sale
By Shauna Shindler Special to the Kansan
Bargain shoppers, prepare!
The annual Downtown Lawrence sidewalk sale will be held from "sun-up to sundown" tomorrow. Massachusetts Street sidewalks will be lined with discounted merchandise. Refreshments and entertainment will abound.
"It's a great event. There are thousands of people there," said Joe Flamery, president of Weaver's department store, 901 Massachusetts St. The store participates in the sale each year.
"It's such an anticipated event that, not only do most of the people in Lawrence shop the sidewalk sale, but people from Kansas City, Topeka and the surrounding areas also come," Flannery said.
The sidewalk sale, held the third Thursday in July, has been an annual event for 29 years, said Lisa Blaire, an administrator for Downtown Lawrence, Inc., which organizes the sale.
Downtown Lawrence, Inc. estimates that 40 percent of sidewalk-sale shoppers are from outside the Lawrence area, Blaire said.
The shoppers return year after year
because of the bargains. But merchants warn that the best selections often go early. Although the sale doesn't officially start until 7 a.m., some shoppers arrive at 6 or earlier, Blaire said.
Anne Yetman, co-owner of The Bay Leaf,
725 Massachusetts St., said that many bargains can be found at closing time when merchants don't want to bring things back into the store.
Weary shoppers can take a break from bargain hunting to enjoy live entertainment. Creation Station, 726 Massachusetts St., plans to have several bands, including White Trash and Lip-Smacking Kitty Lunch, perform in front of the store from 1 to about 8 or 9 p.m., store manager Dawn Narramore said.
In addition to the discounts offered by Massachusetts Street merchants, 18 nonprofit organizations will sell their goods along the sidewalk, Blaire said. The KU Malaysian Student Association will sell native food, and the University Theater will sell T-shirts, mugs and theater tickets. The Haskell Indian Nations University basketball league will sell Indian tacos. Several other KU clubs, local schools, churches and other groups also will sell food, drinks and crafts.
Operators are standing by to cut you off.
When it's time to get your electricity turned off, the only line you'll have to deal with this year is the one attached to your telephone.
Just call 1-800-794-4780 anytime day or night.