CAMPUS/AREA
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday, December 2, 1993
3
LIGHTING THE TOWN
Paul Kotz / KANSAN
The Christmas display at the home of Alice and Charles Stone is one of the largest displays in the Lawrence area. The display includes about 30,000 lights and several hundred figurines. The house, located about three miles south of Lawrence on U.S. 59 can be seen from the highway.
An antique car, with Santa and Mrs. Claus at the wheel, sits in the yard of Alice and Charles Stones' home.
Holiday displays can brighten the holiday spirit
By Shan Schwartz
Kansan staff writer
Students seeking a break from final projects and exams can find some holiday cheer just a short drive from the University.
Holiday displays in Topeka, Kansas City and Lawrence offer students an inexpensive night trip to view both historical and modern settings dressed in lights.
--each January, the tree is cut into lumber and made into commemorative ornaments sold by Hallmark for charity the next holiday season. Free musical entertainment is presented inside the Crown Center shopping center during December.
In Lawrence, the Convention and Visitors Bureau this year is sponsoring a "Festival of Poinsettias," with poinsettia displays at several stores in Lawrence. The biggest display is at the Eldridge Hotel, 701 Massachusetts St., with a 12-foot poinsettia tree made of 120 poinsettias. More than 300 poinsettias are in the hotel lobby.
One of the biggest light displays around Lawrence is at the home of Alice and Charles Stone, three miles south of Lawrence on U.S. 59. The driveway is lined with lighted archways and toy soldiers, and the lawn is filled with a nativity scene, elves, and Santa and his sleigh.
The Stones estimate that their display has about 30,000 lights.
Alice Stone said that they only had been decorating their home for three years but that the display grew quickly.
"We started out just putting some lights here and some lights there and a few trees," she said. "But the next year, we decided we couldn't stop there."
--each January, the tree is cut into lumber and made into commemorative ornaments sold by Hallmark for charity the next holiday season. Free musical entertainment is presented inside the Crown Center shopping center during December.
Kansas City has many neighborhoods, parks and shopping centers with holiday lights, but one of the most famous is the Country Club Plaza, a historic shopping and dining district. The Spanish-style architecture of the Plaza is lit up by 175,000 lights connected by 60 miles of wires.
Crown Center, a convention and shopping center owned by Hallmark Cards, boasts the nation's largest Christmas tree. The tree is 100 feet tall and decorated with more than 5,600 lights and 900 large ornaments. After it is taken down
A train of reindeer covered with Christmas lights pulls Santa on his sled as part of the display at the Stone's home, three miles south of Lawrence on U.S. 59.
--adorned with lights and decorations. Grassy islands at each intersection of the brick-lined streets also are decorated, displaying holiday stories, songs and poems for drive-by visitors.
In Topeka, the state Capitol building and grounds are filled with a diverse collection of holiday decorations. Christmas trees inside the Capitol are traditionally decorated by German, Polish and Mexican groups, which have significant populations in Kansas. Christmas trees and other lighted decorations highlight the Capitol and state Supreme Court building grounds.
The historic Potwin Place neighborhood in Topeka is another area exquisitely decorated for the holidays. Large restored houses of Victorian baroque, Italianate and 19th-century farmhouse styles all are
Holiday displays
Lawrence
Festival of Poinsettias — Displays of poinsettias at various merchants in Lawrence, with the largest display at the Eldridge Hotel, 701 Machusetts St.
Topeka
State Capital Grounds — 10th and Jackson streets. From interstate 70 take 10th Street exit and go four blocks west on 10th.
Potwin Place neighborhood — 4th and Potten Green streets. Take 4th street exit from Interstate 70, go 16 blocks west on 4th Street.
Oakwood Hills neighborhood — 42nd and Adams streets. Take South Topeka exit from the Kansas Turnpike, go south on U.S. 75 (Topia Ave.) to 45th Street, east on 45th to Adams, north on Adams to 42nd.
Country Club Plaza - 47th and Broadway streets. Take Interstate 35 north to Shawnee Mission Parkway, go east on Shawnee Mission Parkway
Crown Center — Pershing and Main streets. Go north on Main from the Plaza, or south on Main from Downtown Kansas City.
KANSAN
On Topeka's south side, the Oakwood Hills neighborhood displays more modern lights and decorations on each home. Visitors are welcome to park and walk to see the animated lawn figures, window displays and candle-lit sidewalks.
Television programming is too violent, professors say
They say guidelines needed to require more diverse shows
By Brian James Kansan staff writer
Aletha Huston and John Wright think there is too much violence on commercial television today.
Huston and Wright, co-directors of KU's Center for Research on the Influences of Television on Children, think that too often the television industry ignores its responsibility to provide educational programming, choosing instead to run violent programs that are popular with TV viewers and advertisers.
Ultimately, these are negative influences for children and teen-agers, said Huston and Wright, both professors of human development and family life.
Results from nearly 350 university studies revealed that people became more aggressive as they watched more violence on television, Wright
"But saying television damages kids is like saying libraries damage kids because they've got bad books," Wright said. "Television is like a library whose founders went out and bought a lot of trashy paperbacks to get started quick — but they are planning, or at least we're hoping they're planning, to enlarge and enrich their collection of works."
He said that TV violence had a significant impact on children and teenagers, often desensitizing them to violent acts.
"Can most kids handle watching violence on TV? Yes, but not the kids who are on the edge, who are angry and at risk," he said.
said.
Those youths are most likely to act out their aggressions, he said.
Huston said she thought TV violence affected people of all ages.
"Most of us won't literally go out and hurt someone after we've seen violence on TV. It works differently than that," she said. "It embeds in us a feeling that violence is acceptable, that it is an easy and quick solution."
Huston and Wright said they would like to see stricter regulations on television programming. For example, tougher guidelines that would increase the amount of educational programming could be enforced when broadcasters renewed their licenses, Wright said.
"We're not endorsing censorship but just telling the broadcasters that they have to do a better job," Wright said.
But not everyone wants to see stricter regulations placed on television broadcasters and producers.
Max Utsler, associate professor of broadcast journalism, said television was not any more responsible for society's ills than other media.
"I'm really weary of hearing everybody blame television for all of the social problems in the 20th century." Utsler said. "I'd like to think television is responsible for a great number of positive types of behavior, but you'll never see TV get credit for that."
Utsler said he was strongly opposed to the regulation of television's programming content. He said the market would determine when television violence became too excessive for people to tolerate.
"A good example of this was Morton Downey Jr. being taken off the air a few years ago," he said. "When he got too absurd, people stopped watching him, and the show was yanked."
Utsler said MTVs "Beavis and Butt-head" cartoon, the subject of recent television violence controversies, was a harmless satire.
"Jeepers, let's give some people credit for their intellect," he said. "When they suggested taking it off, that was ridiculous. There has to be some parental responsibility first."
Angela Lucero, Topeka senior, said that she thought children imitated what they saw on television.
"When I've worked with children in the past, some of them would come in and hit chop each other like the (Teenage Mutant) Ninja Turtles," Lucero said. "They see this on TV, and often they don't know any better."
Lucero said she thought violence on television would increase.
"People like violence—and kids do, too," Lucero said. "There's no easy solution."
Oread parking plan up for vote
Neighborhood group's proposal will go to city council if approved
By Tracl Carl
Kansan staff writer
And, if they succeed, KU students who are now squeezing their cars into parking places on the neighborhood's streets will be forced to find a new place to park.
The residents of homes and apartments directly east and north of campus have completed a proposal to take back their streets.
The Oread Neighborhood Association will be voting on a parking permit proposal during its meeting at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at 946 Ohio St.
The proposal would use permits to limit parking to residents only. If it passes, the association will submit the proposal to the city for approval.
But KU students and employees, many of whom commute from other cities, park on streets such as Ohio and Mississippi and force residents to park blocks away from their homes, Brown said.
So far, the association has had very little opposition to the proposal, said Jennifer Brown, the association's coordinator.
Many homes in the Oread neighborhood were built at the turn of the century without garages or driveways. For many residents, the streets are the only place to park their cars.
The association originally chose the times between 7 a.m. and 2 p.m. to prohibit people from parking on the streets, which is when most arrive.
Business owners at 12th Street and Oread Avenue asked the association to consider changing the time to 7 to 11 a.m. so that the permits would not affect their early afternoon business, Brown said. The association will decide on one of the two times Wednesday.
The proposal
The proposal originally restricted the number of permits an apartment or home could buy to three. The area has a
The Oread Neighborhood Association's parking proposal includes:
■ the area between Tennessee and Maine streets and between Ninth and 14th streets;
■ limiting parking to residents with permits from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. or from 7 to 11 a.m. Monday through Friday. The association will decide the times Wednesday;
■ issuing $10 permits through the city clerk's office to anyone who could show proof of residence or ownership in the designated area and a vehicle registration. They also could receive one guest permit:
tickets issued by police officers to anyone without a permit that could cost a minimum of $10 to a maximum of $100. Repeat violators be towed.
KANSAN
large number of apartments and the problem of whether to issue the permits to renters or landlords encouraged the association to abandon permit restrictions per household.
"The only thing permit parking can control is parking by nonresidents," Brown said. "It doesn't make sense to limit parking per household."
Under the present proposal, anyone who owns a car and lives or owns property in the area that requires permits can apply for one.
The permits would not be effective from Aug. 15 to Sept. 1 so that students could move in and out of apartments. Nearby residents who want to be added to the permit program can apply to the association.
Last spring, representatives from the scholarship halls told the association they were concerned about the proposal because they often had to park on city streets when University parking was full. Brown said.
Bob Kraft, Concordia junior and Grace Pearson Scholarship Hall resident, 1335 Louisiana St. said he did not like the parking permit idea. Parking in the University lots is not as hard this year after a lot was added, but there still can be times when the lots are full, he said.
"That area is overflow for us," he said.
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