The News record
SERVING THE PEOPLE OF MADISON COUNTY
On thm Inside . . .
Mars Hill Holiday
Parade And Fair
.... See Page 3
78th Year No. 46
PUBLISHED WEEKLY IN THE COUNTY SEAT AT MARSHALL. N.C.
THURSDAY, November 22, 1979
15* Per Copy
Project Approved To Fight Erosion
A $153,000 project has been
approved to combat the
serious erosion of the grounds
of Madison High School.
This project is the first to be
funded in Region B (Madison,
Buncombe, Henderson and
Transylvania counties) as an
RCfcb project- Resource Con
servation and Development
Three-quarters of the cost of
the program will be paid for
by the U.S. Department of
Agriculture, and one-quarter
will be paid by Madison Coun
ty
The agreement to re-work
the high school site, which has
been discussed for several
years, was officially approved
on Nov. 13 by John Nelson of
the Soil Conservation Ser
vice's area office iq
Waynesville, Robert L. Ed
wards, Madison County
Superintendent of Schools,
and Emery Metcalf of the
Madison Soil and Conserva
tion District.
FIRE FIGHTERS fom Marshall and
Newport as well as Hot Springs gathered to
combat the blaze.
Joe Wallace Promoted
To New Post In S. C.
Joe Wallace, district ranger
? the UJ>. Forest Service in
Hot Springs, has been pro
moted to a new position in
South Carolina.
Wallace, who has worked in
the Pisgah National Forest
since March of 1977, will
assume the position of district
ranger at the Andrew Pickens
Ranger District in Gunter Na
tional Forest. He will be based
at Walhalla, SC., which is
located about 100 miles south
of Hot Springs along the east
face of the Appalachian Moun
tains.
"The Pickens District is
larger and more complex than
the district here," said
Wallace, "but otherwise the
terrain is very similar.
"In fact," he said, "a lot of
the challenge of that job will
center around the Chatooga
River. It became very well
known when the movie
''Deliverance' was filmed
there; it acquired a good deal
o I mystique, and the number
af people going down it in rafts
and kayaks has increased
tremendously during the last
few years. There are any
number of outfitters bringing
people along the river through
the national forest, and I
understand that the rangers in
foe district have the respon
sibility of training and approv
ing all the guides. One guide
irowned there a couple of
meks ago, so I can see that
.his program is going to take a
ot of my attention."
Wallace and his wife Jean
tnd their two sons, John and
Jcott, aged II and 8, will live
it the ranger station in
falhalla. Wallace has been
with the Forest Service for 16
yean, and during that time he
has worked in six southern
states, including South
Carolina.
"My family and I are really 4
torn by all this moving
around," he said as he was
loading a U-Haul truck outside
his Hot Springs office. "One
minute I just want to find a
nice district like this one in
Madison County and stay put
for good, and the next minute I
want to climb right to the top
of this organization and do
something about the' way deci
sions are made."
Wallace said that the
cooperation of the people of
Madison County during his
tenure has been exceptionally
good. "It's just been tremen
dous," he said. "The users of
the forest land have been very
cooperative in every way.
We've had hardly any fires in
the last three years. We've
had to close a few roads
because of erosion, but when
we explained our reasons, by
golly the people have gone
along with us and helped us
out. The local officials have
always backed our decisions,
and that always makes the job
so much easier. There are
places where the doesn't hap
pen - especially when a larger
city is nearby and people
aren't in touch with what's
really happening in the forest.
But this county has just been
great."
Bob Haggard, the assistant
ranger in Hot Springs, will
serve as acting ranger pen
ding the appointment of a
replacement.
The county Board of Educa
tion is the contracting agent
for the work, which will be in
spected by Harold Tew, the
project engineer based in
Waynesville, and Bill Brown
of the Soil Conservation Ser
vice in Marshall.
The need for major revision
of the high school site has been
obvious for years. It is
dramatized by numerous ero
sion gullies on virtually every
side of the school building, an
800-foot-long swampy depress
sion between Highway 25/70
and the approach road to
Walnut Creek Road, the
undermining and tilting of the
sidewalk above the sta&um
seats, extremely poor
drainage of the football field,
and, most spectacularly, a
steep, ever-wider "Madison
canyon" which is steadily and
rapidly eating its way toward
the northern sideline of the
football field.
This widening canyon has
Fire Guts Motel
In Hot Springs
A sudden fire severely burn
ed the Alpine Court motel in
Hot Springs on Nov. 14.
As the News-Record went to
press, insurance agents had
not established the amount of
the damage. Preliminary
estimates by the fire depart
ment were that nearly half the
motel was destroyed.
The fire began at approx
imately 5:50 p.m., according
to Fire Chief Carol Anderson,
and spread rapidly through
the motel. The source of the
fire was the laundry room and
laundry and furnace room at
the right-fengle center of the
L-shaped building. Anderson
said it probably started in
either the old oil furnace or the
vrpputt clothes dryer
' "it was one of the worst
kinds of buildings to fight a
fire in," said Anderson after
ward. "The motel was built
r nearly 30 years ago and they
ieft a clear area up beneath
the slate roof where the smoke
and flames could spread fast.
Nowadays, with modern
building codes, they would
have the concrete walls of
4-H Collegiate
Club Begun
There is now a new club at
Mars Hill College - the Mars
Hill 4-H Collegiate Club. Dr.
Ed Cheek, Mars Hill pro
fessor, Sharon Carter and
Gary Ealey, 4-H agents, are
advisors for the club. These
three, along with Allen Stines,
Mars Hill student, have been
instrumental in forming the
collegiate club.
At the first meeting the 4-H
agents gave a slide presenta
tion and talk on the Madison
County 4-H program. The club
discussed their past ex
periences in 4-H and ways that
they could share their 4-H ex
periences and knowledge with
the Madison County 4-H'ers.
Officers for the collegiate
club elected Nov. ? are: presi
dent, Marty Haney; vice
president, James Brigman,
secretary-treasurer, Edith
Cheek; and reproter, Penny
Prisby.
Other founding members
are Connie Hill, Sandy Ver
non, John Steele and Charles
Dockett.
each room extending right up
to the roof so a fire couldn't
spread like that."
Both the Marshall and the
Newport, Tenn., fire depart
ments came to the aid of the
Hot Springs department, and
even so the fire was not
brought under control until
about 7:30 p.m. "We want to
thank both those depart
ments," said Anderson. "They
were a tremendous help."
The owners of the motel,
Harold and Virginia Ander
son, were in Asheville when
the fire broke out, visiting
relatives at the hospital. Ac
cording to Carol Anderson,
Harold's brother, the motel
will probably be repaired and
returned to use. it is presently
the only m?M ia town. A se- -
cond motel, Henderson's
Court, was destroyed when the
French Broad River flooded in
1977.
Fire Chief Anderson said
that the majority of the
damage was done by water
and smoke. "That old oil just
poured out black smoke," he
said. "The whole town turned
out to watch; some people
thought the whole town was on
fire.
"The fire service had just
moved to a new building,
almost across the street from -
the motel. So it didn't take us
any time to get there. We tried
to contain it in the center sec
tion, but that smoke just
poured into all the rooms
because of the way it was
built. The rooms where my
brother and sister-in-law live
are at the end, but they are
just a mess, with oily black
smoke covering the walls."
Hot Springs has only olie fire
truck, nearly 30 years old, and
Chief Anderson says there is
an urgent need for a second
truck. "This one did all right
in this fire, but every time we
use it we just have to keep our
fingers crossed that nothing
will break down. And by state
laws when we have only one
truck we can't take it outside
the town limits to fight a fire,
even to a house only a mile
away. We cant leave the town
unprotected. We cant help the
people down in the shunt -
ins/Paint Rock area, where
there are a lot of houses. With
a second truck we coukl do
that."
BILL BROWN of the Soil Conservation Ser
vice stands in "Madison Canyon," a large
erosion gully just below the rim of the foot
ball field at Madison High School. His hand
rests on the drainpipe that caused it.
Numerous truckloads of tires, fill and bran
ches have been dumped there ? to no avail.
Gov. Hunt Honors Marshall
With 'Excellence' Award
Marshall was officially
honored as a Governor's Com
munity of Excellence by Gov.
James B. Hunt Jr. in Raleigh
Thursday during the Gover
nor's Conference on Economic
Development.
Gov. Hunt presented the
award to James Story, former
editor of the News Record and
now editorial consultant and
columnist for that paper.
"I am proud of the progress
which communities like Mar
shall have made during the
past year," Gov. Hunt said.
"It is an achievement which
they can relish with great
pride. The work which has
been done in qualifying for
this honor also represents a
big step toward better job op
portunities."
Story was requested to ac
cept the award in the absence
of Mayor Lawrence Ponder
who was unable to attend.
To qualify for the award,
Marshall had to meet the
basic criteria required by new
industry which among other
things includes an organiza
tion for putting together and
presenting the town's story,
adequate labor, industrial
sites, financing and access to
markets.
A total of 77 communities,
all with populations of 15,000
or less, received Community
of Excellence awards.
Two highway entrance signs
noting the honor will be fur
nished. In addition, special
consideration will be given
these communities in the
search for industrial plant
sites.
Approximately 1,000 people
attended the award ceremony.
GOV. JAMES HUNT presents
Community of Excellence Award
to James Story, former editor of
the News-Record
Winter Cold I The Slow Menace Of Hypothermia
V
? About 175 public service
employees were told some
Shocking news at a meeting in
Hart Hill last week. Approx
imately 25,000 Americans die
tack year of the cold.
; At a workshop in Balk
Federation of Henderson to
educate community represen
tatives about hypothermia.
Some of the groups
represented were the Oppor
tunity Corp. of Madison
Buncombe counties, the Blue
Ridge Opportunity Corp.,
Macon for Progress, Mountain
Projects and Pour Square
There were M public service
employee* from Madison
County, representing the
public schools, day care
aware of the extremely cold
winter days," said Lonnie
Burton, executive director of
the Aaheville office of the Op
portunity Corp. "With the high
rate of inflation and the ever
rising coat of fuel, I'm aura a
number of ua have been con
cerned about how we are go
ing to make it in the mootha to
com M
Mabel McKaight ef the
9eator Citizens' Federation,
?aid. "Hypothermia ii
something we were going to
A woman from Marshal), upon
hearing this, whispered to a
Mead: "She'll learn a lot
aboat cold all right if she
hang* around a Utile latter . "
The principal speaker at the
morning session was W.
Moulton Avery, an authority
oo desert and arctic survival
and executive director of the
Carottaa Wilderness Institute,
who defined hypattarmia
simply as "low body
temperature Under condi
tions of prolonged cold, he
P i, a person will probably
die unless an external heat
source, like a hot water bottle
or electric blanket, is applied.
In ,a forceful introAiction,
Avery said that part of the
dai*er of hypothermia is that
so HtUe is known or said about
it. The elderly poor are most
in danger ; a person may sit in
as underrated house for
days, with his or ber body
"The situation is not, I am
sorry to report, going to get
any better," said Avery. "I
don't think the federal govern
ment is going to be able to bail
us out this winter. I've been
appalled at the lack of concern
about this problem in
Washington. I feel that the on
ly way to deal with it la
through your own com
munities
"This is one of six training
sessions I'll be giving in North
training effort in hypothermia
anywhere in the country.
"Hypothermia is killing
thousands and thousands of
adults in this nation. They die
in their own homes, and the
of death is listed as any
of things ? but not
hypothermia. We as
this. So what you art- 1
'hould be con
critical information
RL aren't many time, in
,mr live, when we have a
Jurors Listed
' "???'? "y" **???
For Superior
Court Duty
The following people have
been chosen to serve as jurors
in Madison County for the
Superior Court session beginn
ing Nov. 26, 1979:
Tony Glenn King, Thurman
Allen, William George
Roberts, Jeter Cantrell,
Pauline Randall Payne,
Patricia Goforth Wilde,
Lockie Edgar Slagle, Kenneth
Bond Franklin, Van Proffitt,
David King, iir
Jr
Lawrence B. Cuts hall, Mrs.
Trilby Sams, Oscar Wayne
Franklin, James Bruce
Massey., Roy Sams, Elsberry
D. Wyatt, Evelyn Allen
McLeod, Robin Sprinkle
Buckner, Linda Gail Penland,
Royal E. Akins,
Manassie Gunter, Lemuel
H. Kent, David Windsor, Kay
S. Wilde Gosnell, Dora P.
Ricker, Christa Pearl
Landers, Bobby Alvin Griffin,
L.B. Ramsey, Bruce Glenn
Davis, Fred Bailey,
Dewey Griffin Sr., Barbara
Sommers Bearden, Clement
Buckner, Frederick Anthony
Metcalf, Mack Rathbone,
Belva M. Laws, Gary Alan
Nance, Joyce Elaine Thomas,
Ethel B. Hensley, D.G.
Church,
Viola M. Ramsey, Eunice
Rice, Robert Shook, Clarence
Hensley, Donell Murray, Bet
ty McPheters Phillips, Bonnie
Williams. Billie Joe (Mrs.)
Beasiey, Charles Douglas
Norton, Roger W. Robinson,
E. Blakely, Lela M.
Zell B. Hawkins,
Suttles Lawson,
Chandler, Patricia
Herachel
, Jeffrey Allen Lowe,
Ronald