The Aaron Story
Smoke Signals, Wednesday, April 3, 1974— PAGE 3
Babe Ruth Record to Be Broken
NEW MEMBERS OF PHI THETA
KAPPA — Julie Ann Applegarth, Lula
A. Blizzare, Melinda D. Bolton, Benita
L. Bridgers, Philip L. Bryant, Rickey
Glenn Butler, Wanda Kay Butler,
Dwight G. Collier, Jeffrey Joseph
Dance, Walter Raleigh Garris, Jr.,
Keiko Hanasto, Catherine Lynn
Hemmila, Chester B. Hill, Jr., Donna'
M. Jenkins, Hugh Banks Lewis,
Marvin George McCanna, HI, Phil
Adam Matthews, Jorge Luis Nassar,
Carla Grace Riley, Bobbie Jean
Rothenberg, Jeffrey Alan Saul, Michael
A. Salvaggio, Sheree Diane Smith, Gary
Lyn Swing, Bernard F. Taylor, Thomas
Wilson Vinson, Ellen Ruth Walston,
Benjamin Franklin Warren, Deborah L.
White, David Martin Woods.
ATLANTA (AP) — That skin
ny kid who was swatting pop
bottle caps with a mop handle
some three decades ago has be
come the biggest name in
sports today, soon to eclipse a
record once thought secure for
ever.
Hank Aaron begins his 21st
major league season this week,
needing only two home runs to
break the all-time record of 714
held by the legendary Babe
Ruth.
Aaron, one of eight children,
spent his childhood in Mobile,
Ala., developing a love for
baseball that has evolved into
fame and fortune.
“He was always crazy about
playing baseball, but I’d never
thought about him becoming a
player until the Brooklyn Dodg
ers came to Mobile for an exhi
bition game when Henry was
about 11,” recalls his father,
Herbert, a retired boat dock
worker.
“I took him to see the game
and he told me that night at the
ball park, ‘I’m going to be in
the big leagues myself. Daddy,
before Jackie Robinson is
through playing.’”
Robinson, who broke the col
or barrier in major league
baseball, was Aaron’s boyhood
idol, much as Aaron has be
come the idol of millions of
young blacks today.
“I saw Babe Ruth play my
self when I was a kid in Mo
bile.” the elder Aaron said,
“but until a couple of years ago
I never dreamed I’d have a son
who might break Ruth’s
record.”
Hammerin’ Hank says he
doesn’t recall when he first
heard of Ruth, the legendary
figure with flamboyant life
style, totally unlike that of the
quiet 40-year-old Atlanta
Proposed Cheating
Hugh Downs Plans Movie Policy Approved
NEW YORK (AP) — Hugh
Downs has become a producer
in a flying scarf. A broadcaster
by vocation and pilot by avoca
tion, he recently roared off into
the movie and barnstorming
business — simultaneously.
It’s resulted in a documenta
ry film called “Nothing by
Oiance,” based on a wonderful
1969 book of the same name
that pilot-author Richard Bach
wrote before his best-selling
“Jonathan Livingston Seagull.”
The movie, which Downs
says will be released for the
aters but not television late this
spring, is sort of a pilot’s an
swer to “The Endless Sum
mer,” a popular surfing docu
mentary of a few years ago.
Bach, who co-produced the
film, “assembled all the pilots
and got a marvelous crew,”
Downs said. The aviators
ranged from a genuine old-time
barnstormer to a jetliner cap
tain from California.
The movie was filmed last
summer with a fleet of five
biplanes built in the 1920s when
barnstorming — taking adven
turous citizens for a quick hop.,
around the pea patch — was in
full and glorious bloom.
The jet-age barnstormers did
the same thing, starting in
Weeping Water, Neb., and end
ing a month later in Rio, Wis.
They were surprised to find
then they’d even turned a small
profit.
“The great thing about it was
that we could avoid airports al
together if we wanted to,” said
Downs, who didn’t take cash
customers aloft and concen
trated on producing and sub
sequent narrating chores.
“If you can find a level field
that a farmer will let you land
in — if it’s not too far from a
little town — then you fly the
fleet over,” he said of the mod
ern recreation of flying’s good
old days.
Publicizing the flights was
done as in the early days, he
said. Parachutists tumbled
from planes, mock dogfights
raged and aerobatics ran ramp
ant as curious crowds trooped
to the landing field.
Those who would be among
the eagles and had $3 in cash
were taken aloft for a short
ride, Downs said, “and the fun
ny thing is that we were claim
ing to be the only anti-in
flationary force in America.
“When Glenn Curtiss started
barnstorming after World War
I, he charged $15 and Charles
■ Undbergi'in the-1920s, charged
$6.’'-
The barnstormers, Bach
among them, weren’t on salary.
“Bach felt that would have
destroyed the spirit of it, so
they all took one per cent of the
movie,” Downs said, referring
to a percentage of the film’s
potential earnings.
‘Then they had to live off of
what they made. The theory
was that if you didn’t get
people up in the air, paying for
rides, you couldn’t buy your
hamburgers. You went to bed
hungry under your wing.”
That didn’t happen, he said,
“so Bach really proved that he
was right — that barnstorming,
which died in the 1930s when
the banks closed, could be re
vived.”
Downs thinks the movie will
make money. But he isn’t put
ting all his eggs in one cocl^it.
He’s hosting a one-hour ABC
special Sunday that’s based on
“Variety,” the show-biz bible,
and hopes it’ll become a regu
lar weekly series next season.
He’s also serving as execu
tive producer on a new tele
vision talk-variety show, star
ring Lena Horne, that will be
syndicated soon.
Two Streakers
Get Jail Terms
Briefs
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP)
— Mountain Grove Cemetary
officials have recovered the
head of a statue of Tom
Thumb. It had been missing
since last week when vandals
damaged the 100-pound figurine
erected in 1857 as a memorial
to the 40-inch circus midget.
The head was found perched in
a tree near the gravesite.
DOVER TOWNSHIP, N.J.
(AP) — Mayor Ethel Zaun has
set aside certain times of the
year for streaking — running
public in nude; Feb. 29, except
in leap years, and the sixth
week of March.
The proclamation issued
Wednesday says: “Any citizen
caught streaking at any other
than on the officially sanctioned
period may be subject to a pen
alty of up to $1 for each pound
of flesh exposed in such activi
ty.”
ROME (AP) — A Rome court
today convicted two American
youths of committing acts
against public decency by
streaking across St. Peter’s
Square. They were sentenced to
five days in jail.
The pair, Raymond Johnson,
20, Portsmouth, N.H., and Rob
ert Mesnard, 20, Dvon, Pa.,
were arrested last Saturday
night and had already served
the five days in Rome’s Re-
bibbia prison.
They were expected to be re
leased from custody later.
The court also sentenced
Johnson to an additional 15
days for originally giving police
a klse name, but the sentence
was suspended.
The youths originally were
charged with committing ob
scene acts and with resisting
arrest. David Dibagno of
Greensburg, Pa., arrested fully
clothed near St. Peter’s Square
shortly after the two streakers
were apprehended, also was
charged with resisting arrest.
The prosecutor sked that this
charge against all three be dis
missed and the court agreed.
The court also agreed to re
duce the obscenity charge
against Johnson and Mesnard
to indecency.
The prosecutor told the court
that streaking was a “return to
nature,” and should not be con
sidered obscene. But he said
running nude in such a setting
as the Vatican required some
punishment to discourage repe
tition.
Police said seven other
youths had streaked through St.
Peter’s Square below the apart
ment of Pope Paul VI. They es
caped despite warning shots
fired in the air.
The trial came only five days
after the arrest of the trio, un
precedented speed for Italy’s
judiciary machinery. Normally
alleged law breakers wait in
jail for months, sometimes
years, before they are brought
to trial.
Johnson and Mesnard are
students at Trinity College,
Conn. Dibagno is a Temple Uni
versity student.
Upon conviction on the origi
nal charges Johnson and Mes
nard could have been given
sentences up to eight years, Di
bagno up to five.
COLLEGE STUDENT’S POETRY ANTHOLOGY
The NATIONAL POETRY PRESS
announces its
SPRING COMPETITION
The closing date for the submistion of manuscriDU by College Students is
April 10
ANY STUDENT attending eiUier junior or senior college is eligible to submit
his verse. There is no limitation M to form or theme. Shorter works are pre
ferred by the Board of Judges, beatuse ^ce limitations.
Each f>oem must be TYPED or PRINTED on a separate sheet, and must
bear the NAME and HOME ADDRESS of the student, and the COLLEGE
ADDRESS as well.
MANUSCRIPTS should be sent to the OFFICE OF THE PRESS
NATIONAL POETRY PRESS
3210 Selby Avenue
Los Angeles, Calif.
90034
The following proposed policy
on academic cheating, after
having been approved by the
Chowan College faculty, will be
presented to Student Legislature
Tuesday night, March 24, 1974. If
the proposed policy is approved
by a two-thirds vote of the
Student Legislature after being
tabled for one week, members of
the student body will vote on the
proposed policy change in the
regular SGA election scheduled
for April 19, 1974.
According to the amendment
procedure of the SGA Con
stitution, the proposed policy
change must be published in the
student newspaper at least one
week prior to the election.
Revised Proposed Policy
On Academic Cheating
Becaues Chowan College is an
academic community, the
faculty and administration view
academic cheating as a very
serious matter. Thus, though the
punishment may vary, depending
on the case at hand, it is un
derstood that the penalty will be
severe, up to and including ex
pulsion from the college.
Cheating is defined as the
giving or receiving of aid on any
assignment designed to examine
the student’s skill and or
achievement based on personal
performance with the un
derstanding that plagarism and
perjury are always considered
cheating.
If a faculty member and his
Thompson
Gets Votes
RALEIGH (AP)—Although he
wasn’t even running. North
Carolina State basketball super-
star David Thompson got 169
votes for student body presi
dent.
In fact, Thompson received
one of every six votes cast
Wednesday. Thompson led the
Wolfpack to its first national
championship Monday night as
State defeated Marquette 76-64
in the NCAA finals at Greens
boro.
Only 1,013 of State’s 14,000
students voted for student body
president, the lowest turnout
since 1952.
Ronnie Lee Jessup of Pilot
Mountain won the presidency
with 511 votes. He defeated Joe
M. Conely of Raleigh who re
ceived 302 votes.
dapartmental chairman agree
that there is substantive evidence
that a student has cheated, the
evidence will be presented to the
Academic Dean of the College
who will advise the student. The
student may be offered a waiver.
If the waiver is not offered or is
refused, those responsible for
tffinging charges will present the
matter to the Faculty Judiciary
Committee who will retiffn their
recommendations to the
Academic Dean of the College.
The student may appeal any
decisions through the office of the
Academic Dean of the College.
The student may appeal any
decisions through the offlce of the
Academic Dean and ultimately to
the President of the College.
Ad Hoc Committee on Cheating
Open Forum
Dear Editor,
I wish to relate an experience
which I unwittingly foundered
upon over the springbreak. I
spent the week at a college in St.
Paul, Minnesota, a four year
coeducational school. I found the
school’s policy on dope to be quite
horrifying as I’m sure all con
cerned Chowan Students will. It
seems the school and city of
ficials have an unwritten
agreement where the students
keep all dope and sale of dope on
campus and city officials (i.e.
cops) do not interfere. Needless
to say, being the virtuous Chowan
student that I am, I was trav-
matically shocked. I was deeply
dismayed to walk down the hall of
the dorm in which I did reside
only to discover the halls reeking
of what I suspect was pot. This
prompted me to further in
vestigate the matter. In the
school library in St. Paul, I came
across an interesting article in
my research that I wish to pass
along to both students faculty and
the administration of Chowan. It
seems a study was done in 1884 of
20 regular pot smokers and the
results showed no distinguishable
effects upon them. Of course, I
did a follow up on the report and I
think it should be pointer out that
not one of the 20 is alive today-so
put that in your pipe and toke it!
In conclusion, I would like to
express any deep gratification of
returning to the sterile en
vironment of Chowan College in
which none of this nonsense is
allowed.
I am greatfuUy,
Michael Thrower
401 Parker
Braves’ superstar.
“He used to hit pop tops with
a mop handle for hours,” said
Henry’s father. “You know the
other kids would do the pitch
ing."
Many of Aaron’s pop top
games took place outside Mit
chell Field in Mobile, where he
actually launched his career as
a teen-ager with the Mobile
Black Bears, a semi-pro outfit.
“We used to soak old rags in
kerosene and use them for
lights when we played at
night," Aaron said.
Aaron’s father played a little
amateur baseball and managed
the neighborhood team that
eventually became the Black
Bears.
It was natural that the Aaron
sons would play the game, but
only two. Hank and Tommie,
chose it as a career. Tommie, a
younger brother, spent several
seasons with the Braves. He
now manages Atlanta’s Class
AA farm team at Savannah.
Herbert, an older brother,
played baseball before entering
military service but didn’t con
tinue later. Another younger
brother, James, played in high
school. A fifth Aaron son died
of pneumonia at an early age.
Hank also has three sisters,
Sarah Jones, Gloria Robinson
2,000 Year Old
Indians Found
MIAMI, Fla. (AP) — Arch
eologists probing the banks of
the Miami River at the site of a
demolished hotel have
unearthed evidence of a 2,000-
year-old Indian tribe with a
taste for conch and snails.
“We’re dealing with some
thing like 2,000 years of Miami
liistory,” state archeologist
Ross Morrell said after two
weeks of digging where the old
Granada Hotel once stood.
Morrell says he and another
archeologist, along with volun
teer workers, have discovered
artifacts, animal bones and
shellfish remains dating back
to before the birth of Christ.
Morrell says the discoveries
are being divided into two dis
tinct categories — those dating
to the time the Spanish came
ifl) the Miami River and gave
the Indian tribe they found the
and Alfredia Scott.
Hank, not an ideal pupil, at
tended Mobile’s Central High
School through his junior year
when he desired to begin a
baseball career. However, his
parents insisted he first get a
high school diploma and Ham
merin’ Hank graduated from
the Josephine Allen Institute in
1951.
Aaron began playing for the
Black Bears during his junior
year in high school. In the final
game, he was impressive in a
battle against the Indianapolis
Clowns, who offered him a con
tract the following spring for
$200 a month.
Several years before that,
Aaron had drifted onto the field
during a Brooklyn Dodger
tryout camp at Mobile. Dodger
personnel took one look at the
skinny youngster and told him
to go back home.
Ed Scott, a scout, signed Aa
ron to a contract with the
Clowns on Nov. 20, 1951. The
slugger’s mother had sent him
on his way with a battered suit
case, $2 in his pocket and two
sandwiches to eat along the
way.
Aaron soon drew the atten
tion of Braves’ scout Dewey
Griggs, who eventually signed
Hank for $350 a month plus a
$10,000 payoff to Oowns’ owner
Syd PoUack.
Aaron was assigned to Eau
Claire, Wis., in June 1952. He
hit and was voted the
Northern League’s outstanding
rookie.
The Braves dispatched Billy
Southworth to Eau Claire to
scout Aaron and the former big
league manager filed a glowing
report—“for a baby face kid of
18 years, his playing ability is
outstanding.”
Aaron moved up to the Gass
A South Atlantic League in
1953, playing for the Jackson
ville Tars where he led the
team to the league title and
was named its most valuable
player.
He credits to this day his
Jacksonville manager, Ben
Geraghty, with having one of
the greatest influences on his
baseball career. He played sec
ond base with the Tars and was
converted to the outfield the
following off-season.
Aaron reported to the Braves’
training camp next spring,
ready to play for the club’s
Class AA team in Atlanta. But
a fractued ankle to Bobby
Thomson changed those plans
and launched the Hammer on a
two-decade era of consistency
in the majors.
Making Profitable Venture
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Di
rector Stanley Kramer once
told film students, “If you want
to break into the movie busi
ness, don’t start at the bottom
and work your way up. Go out
and raise money and make
your own film.”
Today an astonishing number
of young film makers are doing
just that. Some of them have
come to grief, spending $200,000
or more on movies that will
never Ije seen by the public. A
few, like Terence Malick, make
it.
Malick, 30, wrote, directed
and produced “Badlands,”
which won rave reviews at last
year’s New York Film Festival
and is being released by Warn
er Brothers. Five years ago he
was teaching philosophy at
M.I.T.
"I was teaching while I was
doing my doctoral work for Ox
ford, where I had spent a
couple of years,” recalled the
roundfaced, baling Malick, a
Harvard graduate. “I wasn’t a
very good teacher, so I dropped
it all to come out here. Why?
I’m not sure. Except that I
wanted to make a living from
something I was enthusiastic
for.”
He had never been a movie
buff, but he thought he might
like to try his hand at film
making. Happily, the American
Film Institute in 1969 was be
ginning its program of fellow
ships for budding film makers.
Malick was accepted.
“It was like going to a voca
tional school,” he said. “We
learned a little theory, especial
ly when directors came to visit,
but mostly it was a matter of
learning how to run machines
— cameras, moviolas, sound,
etc. The training was great. I
would have been lost without
it.”
Malick made a 15-minute film
there and moonlighted as a
script doctor on such movies as
"Drive, He Said” and “Dirty
Harry.” He earned enough to
send his wife Jill through law
school and set aside seed mon
ey for his first feature film. He
began writing a script based on
the murderous rampage of
Charles Starkweather in the
Midwest.
Normally a young film maker
would submit his script to the
major film companies, hoping
they would have the vision to
back him. Malick chose another
route.
“I didn’t try to get studio
backing and I didn’t try to get
stars,” he remarked. “I would
have lost control if I had.”
He financed “Badlands” like
a Broadway play, selling bits
and pieces to investors. His fa
ther, an Oklahoma oil company
ofiicial, contributed $7,000, his
mother-in-law $13,000. A Boston
lawyer put up $39,000 and Los
Angeles financier Max Pavles-
ky $50,000. In 1972 Malick had
enough money to start filming
in Colorado with Martin Sheen
as star and Warren Oates play
ing a brief role as a favor.
“Badlands” nearly floun
dered several times. Malick
hired a Hollywood special ef
fects man to stage a house fire.
The "safe” fire burned the
house and two cameras and
scorched the special effects
man.
A non-union crew of film stu
dents and skin-flick makers
didn’t work out. Malick fired
most of them and shot with a
crew of four. It was down to
two when ha finished the 14-
week schedule.
“My wife Jill held the picture
together,” Malick said. “She
was tremendous, taking care of
all the details that I didn’t have
time for. When we could no
longer afford a caterer, she got
up at 5 a.m. and made fantas
tic lunches. Not just sand
wiches, but beef stroganoff.”
His tribute to his wife, now
an American Civil Liberties
Union lawyer, is in the film
credits: “A Jill Jakes Produc
tion.”
Malick’s venture turned out
happily with the ovation for
“Eiadlands” at the New York
Film Festival and the pick-up
by Warner Brothers, which
paid off the production cost of
"under $500,000” (it was quite a
bit under.) He shares in the
film’s revenues.
Malick is now preparing a
western even though he finds
that the studios now believe
westerns aren’t box office.
"If I can’t get the terms I
want. I’ll go the independent
route again,” he said. “It chan
cy, like betting on a single
number at roulette. But if you
win, you can be rewarded
handsomely.”
name Tequestas and those dat
ing back to an unknown tribe
which flourished here 2,000
years ago.
“Most of the material is
aboriginal and as we move
closer to the river it’s more his
torical,” Morrell said.
Morrell’s discoveries include
a musketball, pipe stems and
buttons left by U.S. soldiers
during the Seminole wars of the
1820s; a piece of ceramic from
a Spanish mission of the 1600s;
a carved-bone pin probably
used as a hair decoration
around the time of Christ; and
Indian pottery dating from a
few hundred years B.C. to the
early 1800s.
The main purpose of the re
search, Morrell says, is to com
pare the artifacts of the Te
questas with those of the ear
lier tribes.
Listei|SmoHgrs:
doi|[t have to wait 20 y^ars
foi^igai^ttes to ^gect y6u.
It only^taKgs 3 secoq^.
In just 3 seconds a cigarette makes your heart beat faster,
shoots your blood pressure up, replaces oxygen in your blood with
cartxin nnoroxide, and leaves cancer-causing chemicals
to spread through your body.
All this happens with every cigarette you snnoke.
As the cigarettes add up, the damage odds up.
Because it's the cumulative effects of smoking—adding this
cigarette to all the cigarettes you ever smoked—
that causes the trouble.
And tell that to your dog, too.
u s. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION, AND WELFARE • Thil SpKe Contributed Public Service