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Ebbs Chapel Sing
Ebbs Chapel Volunteer Fire Dept will sponsor a gospel
singing this afternoon (Wednesday) at 2 o'clock at Upper
Laurel Community Center. Special singers will include the
Kingsmen. Food and other refreshments will be served.
Lawn chairs should be brought.
American Legion
American Legion Post 317's meeting has been postponed un
til August.
Child-Find
A child-find program will be held today from 1 to 7 p.m. at
Upper Laurel Day Care Center.
Annual Rodeo
. * J . " - *
The Marshall Volunteer Fire Dept. reminds people of the
area about the annual Rodeo, to be held today and tomorrow,
July 3 and 4, on the Island at Marshall. Features will include
calf-roping, saddle bronc riding, barrel racing and bulkiding,
and a fireworks display will be included.
Delbert and Silver Reunion
The George Delbert and Sudie Silver family reunion will be
held July 7 at 11 a.m. in the Mars Hill Elementary School
cafeteria. All friends and relatives are invited.
Mars Hill Library
Hosts 3rd Forum
On Peace, Patriotism
By PAUMNE CHEEK
The Mars Hill Town Library on
Sunday afternoon at 3 o'clock will
again be the scene of a lively discus
sion of issues related to peacemaking
and patriotism.
To stimulate audience participa
tion, Rev. Marie Bean, campus
minister for Mars Hill College, will
focus on the church and peacemaking
and will report on her trip last year to
Nicaragua.
The public is urged to attend the
event, which is co-sponsored by the
Friends of the Library and the North
Carolina Humanities Committee.
Sunday's forum is the third in a
series designed as part of a state
wide consideration of Church, State
and the First Amendment. In
February 1986 there will be a sym
posium on the subject sponsored by
the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill to which representatives
from each county will be invited.
Anyone interested in further informa
tion or in attending may leave name
and address at one of the county's
branch libraries.
Dr: Gene Rainey, chairman of the
political science department at the
University of North Carolina at
Asheville, introduced the Mars Hill
series with an overview titled
"Politics, Religion and International
Affairs." The current electronic
religion, he said, is not a substitute
for the mainline church but a supple
ment to it. . Calling attention to the
fact that development of the present
"religion of the heart" has coincided
with the emergence of a new type of
civil religion and a resurgence of the
will to use force in foreign affairs.
Rainey said "we have polarized on
moral issues. Liberation theology,
which asks who makes the poor*'
confronts the U.S. with two issues:
whether religion can solve the pro
of the world and whether we
policy, can do in manipulating public
opinion.
In the mid-1960s, Latimer asserted,
the U.S. enjoyed a superiority that
would enable it to make the first
strike, but it has now lost that advan
tage.
"Peace idiots who travel" and
other "useful idiots," he maintained,
are conducting a "disinformation
campaign" and constitute a threat
from within.
During the ensuing discussion, the
dominant view expressed was that
the question is not military but moral.
Among participants were some
hikers on the Appalachian Trail who
happened to be passing through-the
area and came to the library as a way
of finding out about local people
Mars Hill
Plans $1,200
Fireworks
At dark on July 4th, the Mars Hill
Lions Club plans to display $1,200
worth of fireworks-largest such
display the club has ever had
The fireworks display will be the
culmination of the club's celebration
of the holiday starting ?t 6 p.m. on the
4th with hot dogs, hamburgers and
barbecued chicken
%
ofli
As part of a move by the State
Board of Elections to place
Republican majorities on t?* 1<X
county boards. Madison County will
have a new Board of Elections effec
ilan
Relaxing Saturday after acquittal Friday, Jim Adams and his family were off
to see friends in Bluff.
Jury Finds
Jim Adams
N ot Guilty
By ELIZABETH SQUIRE
A Madison County jury Friday
found James Arthur Adams innocent
of first-degree murder and common
law obstruction of the justice in the
1970 death of Nancy Morgan.
Adams planned to delay his return
to his home in Venice, Fla , and spend
most of this week visiting with friends
in the Bluff area, where he was a
Vista volunteer ? and became a
murder suspect ? 15 years ago.
Without those friends, Adams said
after his acquittal, preparations for
his trial and the trial itself wolild
have been "totally unbearable."
Adams had been charged last year
with the 1970 murder of Morgan, a
fellow Vista volunteer whose nude
body was found hog-tied with
parachute cord in such a way that she
strangled. The body was found on
Wednesday, June 17, 1970, in the back
seat of Morgan's car, abandoned in a
wood road off U. S. 25-70 at Tanyard
Gap. Adams was also charged, with
common-law obstruction of justice, a
charge arising from the alleged
removal of the body from the scene of
the crime.
When the prosecution rested on
Wednesday, the third day of the trial.
Judge Robert D. Lewis agreed to
drop a charge of common-law rape.
Adam's attorney, Joe Huff, petitioned
the judge on the grounds that District
Attorney Tom Rusher had not
presented evidence that rape occur
red.
Members of the jury said after the
verdict that they did not find suffi
cient evidence to convict Adams of
any of the charges.
"it seems at times that Johnqy
Waldroup, not Jim Adams, was on
trial here," said Asst. District At
torney James Baker toward the end
of the trial. Witnesses for both the
prosecution and the defense said that
Waldroup had a reputation for not
telling the truth. Yet much of the trial
testimony concerned the truth or un
truth of Waldroup's eyewitnss ac
count of the murder. The prosecution
asked the jury to believe that ac
count.
The defense based part of its case
an the truth of Waldroup's reported
charges that someone was trying to
make him "swfear a bunch of lies ?
and send my soul to hell."
The time of Nancy Morgan's death,
either the night of June 14-15, 1970, as
alleged by Waldroup, or after Tues
June 16, when defense witnesses
of the crime
t made to.Sheriff E. Y. 1
the
loan., meT waidroup at a skating
rink, O'Dell said. Waidroup told him
someone was trying to accuse him of
a murderin North Carolina, "trying
to pack it on him," O'Dell said.
Waidroup told O'Dell of having look
ed in a window and seen a tied body
on a couch, then how "they" forced
him to drive one car to take the body
to the top of a mountain, O'Dell said.
Warren Gillespie of Alexander
testified that "maybe two years
ago," WaLdroup called Gillespie
from jail and told him something was
"eating him up," gfltesbie visited
Waldfoup, who said be had seen the
woman tied up, saw her move, went
in to cut her loose, and someone had
smashed his nose. Adams and
another man were there, and they
had forced him to take part as two
cars were driven to a place where the
body was left in a little-used road.
Waidroup said Adams had thrown
something into the woods, then left,
Gillespie testified. Adams was afraid
to tell because nobody would believe
him, Gillespie said. He had advised
Waidroup to tell and get it off his con
science, Gillespie said.
Sheriff Ponder said that in
December 1963 Waidroup told him
about seeing the body and being
made to help dispose of it. The sheriff
reported further details, for example,
that' Waidroup said that Cleatis
Waidroup, Johnny's brother, and a
friend, Ralph had told Johnny at
about 11:30 on Sunday evening, June
14, that there was a party going on at
Adams' house. The sheriff also said
-Continued on Page 9
Counij Phones
Knocked Out
Because of a construction mishap
in Mars Hill, all local phone service in
Mars Hill and Marshall plus all long
distance service in Madison County
were knocked out from Wednesday
evening until' late Thursday after
noon.
"It was a mess," said Tom Doyle,
state service manager for Continen
tal Telephone, who warned that con
tinued repair work over the next
several days "could possibly, on oc
casion, result" in an interruption for
individual customers for short
periods. "We thank our customers for
their patience and understandings,"
said Doyle.
Doyle said the problem was caused
when Cooper Construction Co. of
Hendersonville, countractor for the
Mars Hill municipal sewer project,
"cut Continental Telephone Co.'s
underground duct system" at the cor
ner of South Main Street and Route
213 in Mars Hill. The duct system, he
added, contained the liber optic local
service facility for Mars Hill and
Marshall, the long distance cable con
necting Madison County with the rest
of the world, and a 300-pair local
Mars Hill service cable. Local ser
vice continued to operate in Hot Spr
ings and Guntertown, Doyle said.
Another Continental official
estimated the cost of repairs at
$30,000 to $35,000 and said Cooper
Construction would be billed for it. -
The phone service interruption
brought many headaches to fire,
police and ambulance services
around the county and played a role
in a major murder trial underway
last week at the Madison County
courthouse (see other story, this
issue). ?
A defense attorney, Ateeph Huff of
Marshall, said the phone interruption
kept him from making calls toward
the end of the trial of James A.
Adams on a charge of murdering
Vista worker Nancy Morgan in 1970.
Huff said he had wanted to summon
several more witnesses but could not
because of the phone problem.
Adams was acquitted.
Continental crews were called in
from the company's eastern five
county service area after the
underground duct service was
severed at about 8:45 p.m. Wednes
day. Long distance service was
restored by 10:45 Thursday morning
(but, of course, required a dial tone
local customers weren't able to get);
local and toll service for Marshall
customers and those Mars Hill
customers not served by the local
300- pair cable were back by 3 o'clock
Thursday afternoon, with all
customers back working by 4:30 that
afternoon.
The mishap affected long-distance
County OKs
5' Tax Hike
The Madison County Board of Com
missioners gave final approval Fri
day to the county's 1985-86 budget,
which calls for a 5-cent tax increase
to 90 cents per $100 of valuation.
Total expenditures planned by the
county for the upcoming year total
$7, $33,481, of which $1,764,000 will be
raised by local property taxes and
$5,709,481 from other sources.
Earlier in the month, the commis
sioners gave tentative approval to a
tax increase; county finance officer
David Caldwell then prepared an
itemized budget that was unveiljd at
a public hearing on Ji^ne 10
miss loners' action Friday placed the
final stamp on the new budget and tax
funds available in support of other in
dustries,
The board also received a report
Monday from the Madison County
ambulance service that it made 88
ambulance runs in June, down from
97 runs in May ; and that total billings
in June were 84,064 and total collec
tions 84,541 53. of which 8385.20
represented delinquent accounts
Decamps Set
Summer Fun
service for 666 phones in Hot Springs
and 472 in Guntertown, along with all
service for 2,544 customers in Mars
Hill and 1,671 customers in Marshall.
Bar Group
Opposes
Court Idea
The Madison County Bar Assn. on
Monday unanimously opposed a plan
being discussed in judicial circles
whereby Madison would be
withdrawn from the 24th Judicial
District and joined with Buncombe
County in the 28th District.
Members of the bar group, the
resolution states, "feel that no good
purpose or advantage would be serv
ed by this proposal," and that the pre
sent district alignment "has served
the people of Madison County and the
cause of justice well."
Madison County is now joined in a
single district with four similarly
sized counties ? Yancey, Mitchell,
Avery and Watauga.
Any change in the districting would
have to be made by the General
Assembly. Combining Madison and
Buncombe into a single district ap
parently has some support from
legislative leaders.
The county bar association's
resolution, sent to the General
Assembly to Bay the group "strongly
opposes" the change, was signed by
Charles E. Mashburn, president of
the t>ar group, and Stephen E. Huff,
its secretary.
Child Hurt
By Car
Jesse Moore, 3, who was badly in
jured two weeks ago when he was
struck by a car on Bear Creek Road,
was reportedly improving this week
at Memorial Mission Hospital in
Asheville.
The child, a grandson of Floyd
Moore of Bear Creek, was struck by a
car driven by Robert A. Lee.
Highway patrol troopers investigated
but made no arrest.
Ambulance service personnel
report that a call about the accident
indicated it occurred in thge Walnut
Creek area, but the ambulance was
unable to locate the child. The child
was taken in the car to the Marshall
Town Hall, from whence the car was
directed to the Marshall-Walnut
clinic. When the ambulance arrived
there, medical personnel at the clinic
had stabilized the child's condition,
and a doctor on the clinic ctaff ac
companied the ambulance to the
hospital.
Injuries included a skull fracture
and wounds bn the left side of the
child's body, as well as internal in
juries.
Nagle Joins
News Record
. '
As Ad Rep.
?
Wayne Nagle of Walnut, a
transplanted Floridian and native
Pennsylvanian, has Joined T>e Newt
Record as an advertising represen
tative.
Nagle, who has been in the printing ,
business since retired two years