Wednesday
Film Festival
Enter The Dragon
February 5,8:00 p.m.
^7 _
January 30, 1986
VOLUME 14
Number 7
• STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF CHOWAN COLLEGE
i
Chowan Freshman
Practices Patriotism
In DaflyLjfe
The day just "doesn t seem right ' for Suzie Hughes unless the American
flag flies correctly on the mast in front of McDowell Columns. The
freshman student soys the national standard is a reminder of the many
things for which we should be thankful.
By Herman Gatewood
Patriotism is more than a subject
discussed in class for Suzie Hughes, a
Chowan College freshman who has
hopes of teaching the deaf and working
with handicapped people. It is a way of
life and something she incorporates in
her daily routine in high school and at
Chowan.
The young teenager begins and ends
her day by paying tribute and respect to
the American flag, and passersby of
Chowan’s historic McDowell Columns
building see her at dusk and dawn
reverently raising and lowering “Old
Glory”.
During the summer months, when
Suzie visited the campus for freshman
orientation, she noticed that the college
flag pole was empty. “This bothered
me greatly,” she said, “because I’m
very proud of America and our flag
should always be flown as a symbol of
our freedom and all the things which
make our country great.”
Returning in late August to begin
studies as a pre-education major, Suzie
again quickly noticed that on some days
the flag was not raised and on others,
when it was displayed, it was raised
and lowered at irregular times.
“I went to see Mr. Ben Sutton, the
business manager, to find out why such
an important responsibility was
overlooked and neglected,” the student
related.
Suzie learned from the business
manager that one of the student
organizations had previously assumed
the flag responsibility, but it was
difficult for members to maintain a
rigid schedule in raising and lowering
the flag. She told Sutton of her respect
and love for the national standard, and
volunteered for the job because she
wanted to make sure that “Old Glory”
was displayed according to established
regulations.
“I was delighted when Mr. Sutton
said that I could have the job,” Suzie
exclaimed, “and he even gave me
permission to keep the flag in my room
each night!”
Since gaining permission, and the
apppreciation of college officials, Suzie
leaves her residence hall at daybreak
each morning to raise the flag, and then
on to her breakfast in the college
cafeteria. When classes have been
completed, and the day draws to a
close, Suzie diligently returns to lower
the flag, fold it properly, and reverently
take it to her room for safekeeping
through the night.
“A lot of people think I’m crazy to do
this,” she says. “Some of my friends
jokingly call me ‘the flag lady’ or ‘Miss
Betsy Ross’, but I don’t mind. I’m
proud of my country and I love America
dearly.”
Pride in her native country is deeply
instilled in the amiable young lady even
though she has faced many hardships in
her nineteen years of life. Suzie was
born in nearby Aulander, but grew up in
five different foster homes and recalls
some unhappy experiences as a foster
child. Since such children are not
allowed to live for extended periods in a
particular home, she has never known
the joys of “family home life.”
Suzie says she has no place that she
can really call home even though
several relatives maintain a room for
her in their homes. She appreciates this
and the Baptist Kennedy Home where
she resided during her high school
years.
“When people ask me where my
Webster’s Dictionary
Being Updated for 1986
David B. Guralnik is one of those peo
ple who find themselves never at a loss
for words.
Guralnik and his staff on the
Webster’s New World Dictionary of the
American I>anguage are coming up
with too many words as time draws
near when the modern-day classic work
is due for a major overhaul.
Big revisions take place every 12-15
years, compared with the biennial revi
sions that may deal with just hundreds
of terms.
The standard reference work, first
published in 1953, is being fully revised
for the second time. Guralnik said he
expected the word count to be
thousands higher than the 160,000-plus
in the current edition, which compares
with 145,000 words in the 1953 original.
"No matter how hard you try to cut it,
you find out that language, and even the
useful language, keeps growing
apace,” the Cleveland native said in an
interview at his downtown office.
' There’s an enormous amount of stuff
that has to go in. No matter how hard
we try to prune it and cull it, we still end
up with more than we have room for."
Although a heavier, thicker book
could accommodate the additions, the
college dictionary by definition must be
kept trim enough to be portable. But it
must also be comprehensive enough to
be useful to a graduate student.
So the extra few thousand words will
probably have to be squeezed in with
the help of more abbreviations and
smaller type.
Present at the creation of the New
World Dictionary, which so far has sold
more than 70 million copies, Guralnik
has had to operate under a succession
of owners. The Cleveland based World
Publishing Co. was sold to the Times-
Mirror Corp. in 1963, to a British con
cern in 1974, then to Simon and Schuster
in 1980.
Despite that, staff turnover has been
slight, caused mostly by death or retire
ment, since the company is oriented to
long-term projects and lacks the
floating pool of lexicographers
available on the East Coast, Guralnik
said.
‘We haven't operated that way,"
said Guralnik, who refused to move to
New York on grounds that he gets a
wider linguistic perspective in the
Midwest.
That perspective comes from poring
over about 200 million words of running
text a year, including comic strips, fic
tion, newspapers, scientific and
technical journals.
Part-time “citators,” as word-
hunters are called, also send in ex
amples from around the country. The
dictionary staff relies in part on con
tributions from retired academics in
diverse and more remote parts of the
country.
The staff gets about 50,000 citations a
year, and the current file stands at 1.3
million. From those will come about
40,000 or 50,000 discrete ‘‘lexemes,”
which means a word or stem that is a
meaningful unit.
Those could be new terms or new
meanings of current terms, or terms
that were encountered before but not
frequently enough to put in the dic
tionary, or an old term that for one
reason or another has become popular
again.
Computers have found their way into
dictionary making, but not as complete
ly as could be expected.
Eventually, he said, there will be a
wide enough range of reading material
accessible by computer so that more
citational work will be done
automatically.
Even then, computers will not be
able to put dictionaries together.
“It will still take a human mind
preferably, a poetic mind,” he said.
HALLEY^S
COmEM
FIRST APPEARANCE IN 75 YEARS
Hailey’s Comet was just a pale smudge the other night. Gazing
west southwest under the cold starlight, we shared our ragged
bits of star savvy. It took a little while, but it was fun to find
Hailey’s Comet a few hours after sunset—even if it was nothing
more than a fuzzy dollop of light.
Most of us have only one chance to see Comet Hailey, which
certainly enhances the drama of it’s 76-year periodic visit. Some
who’d seen it 76 years ago had perhaps seen the famous Daylight
Comet instead—brighter, more sensational, flaring down from
the January sky. But most who saw the comets in 1910 remember
them as glorious. The 1986 visit will be less spectacular than
what Mark Twain called the “magnificent old conflagration” of
1910.
home is, I tell them I feel at home at
Chowan College,” she relates. “Here, I
have my own room, I have friends, a
nice place to take my meals, and I have
come to know what it must be like to
have a family.” Suzie has two brothers
but she rarely gets to visit with them.
Suzie graduated from North Lenoir
High School, near Kinston, where she
was active in several clubs and
maintained a good academic record.
The American flag received correct
attention at the high school, because
Suzie received permission from the
principal to raise and lower the school’s
flag each day and performed the duty
throughout her four years as a student.
“Our high school flag was in poor
shape,” Suzie related, “and I asked
several times if a new one could be
purchased.” When no new flag was
received, Suzie saved money from her
part time job as a waitress and
purchased a flag to fly over the high
school she appreciated so much.
“I didn’t tell anyone I had bought the
flag because I didn’t want any
recognition, but I sure was proud one
day during school assembly when the
entire student body learned what I had
done!”
Discrepancies were found in
Chowan’s flag, too. Being
knowledgeable of flags and protocol,
Suzie points out that the American flag
should always be the larger if it is flown
on the same mast with a state flag, as is
the case at Chowan. “I asked Mr.
Sutton to get a larger flag for the
college, and he said he would,” she
said.
Sutton, who said Suzie’s admiration
for the flag and her patriotism is “an
inspiration for all of us, ” contacted
Senator Jesse Helms and requested a
flag which has flown over the Capitol
Building in Washington.
The attractive redhead, who
possesses a bubbling personality, quick
wit, and a keen mind, plans to major in
deaf education and history during her
college career. Already proficient in
the deaf sign language, she says “I
hope some day to work full time with
the deaf and I also hope that one day I
will be able to adopt a deaf child for my
very own!”
Her use of hands in the sign language
has not came easy. Suzie had an
accident during high school, and two
tendons in her right hand were cut as
well as a a nerve severely damaged.
Surgery followed, but doctors gave
little hope for regaining use of the
fingers and hand.
“I sure wasn’t going to let a cut hand
keep me from doing what I wanted to
do,” Suzie emphatically stated, “and I
told my doctors that I would so use my
hand again!” She worked diligently
exercising the fingers and hand to gain
complete recovery. “I sure can’t teach
deaf people unless I can use my hands
to talk,” she states.
Suzie wishes there were some deaf
people in the area for her to “talk” with
and spread her patriotic philosophy.
Active in Chowan’s Baptist Sttident
Union she has, however, gained a wide
circle of friends and looks forward to
each of the weekly meetings.
The future teacher loves life and
people, but she says her greatest love is
for her country and its flag. “We take so
much for granted and we sometimes
fail to appreciate what we have here. I
guess my flag is a reminder that I have
so much to be thankful for, and so much
to live for.”
Celebrating the
New Year
Champagne flowed and spirits soared
as Americans bid a joyous farewell to
1985, crowding streets, fancy ball
rooms and private parties to ring in
1986 with fireworks, music, and even
weddings in New York City’s Times
Square.
The Orange Bowl Parade rolled Tues
day night in Miami with Mickey Mouse
as grand marshal, and hundreds of
thousands of revelers gathered over
night for the Rose Parade set to kick off
Wednesday in Pasadena, Calif., and the
Mummers strut in Philadelphia.
Videotaped messages by President
Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gor
bachev were broadcast Wednes
day in the United States and in the
Soviet Union.
Rock impresario Dick Clark threw
the rice after Victoria Sanderson and
Wayne Chew married on network
television shortly before midnight
Tuesday, in a club with a panoramic
view of up to 300,000 revelers packed in
to the rainy streets around Times
Square. Another couple also married in
Times Square.
New Year's Eve revelers in Nashville
celebrated aboard a paddlewheeler,
while amateur Chicago sleuths
chartered an “El” train for a gourmet
dinner and the chance to solve a
murder mystery.
Elsewhere, fireworks exploded and
there was enough spirit for to parties
in 1-as Vegas' downtown Glitter Gulch -
one starting at 9 p.m. to accomodate a
network TV broadcast at midnight
EST.
About 100,000 people were expected in
the nation’s capital for the third New
Years’ Eve party at the Old Post Office
Pavilion on Pennsylvania Avenue near
the mall, for rock music, fireworks -
and ballroom dancing inside.
‘‘Times Square has more of a history,
tradition,” said Mayor Marion Barry,
Jr. “But we're gaining on them,.”
In Chicago, 79 people paid $104 each
to watch the actors of “Homicide, Ltd.”
people a whodunit aboard a chartered
Chicago Transit Authority elevated
train. The audience had to solve the
mystery before the ride ended Wednes
day. '
About 450 people rode the General
Jackson showboat for the pad-
dlewheeler’s New Year's Eve cruise on
the Cumberland River near Nashville,
Tenn.
An estimated 300,000 people jammed
Times Square for the festivities,
highlighted by the descent of a giant ap
ple down a flagpole at midnight. The
celebration which began in 1908,
•‘speaks to something that's ancient
and pagan in all of us," said Tama
Starr, timekeeper for the apple drop.
Mickey Mouse was grand marshal for
the Orange Bowl Parade. “A Dream is
a Wish" was the theme of the parade
featuring 32 floats and 21 bands.
Philadelphia’s Mummers strut, bill
ing itself as the world’s longest parade
at 13 hours, geared up for Wednesday.
Other Southern California New
Year's Eve celebrations include a
Hailey's comet party at Griffith Obser
vatory in Los Angeles.