North Carolina Newspapers

/ Pick the Football Contest winners! I Second Class Postage Paid at S 1 Black Mountain. N.C. 28711 ■ ■ursdav. October 6. 1977, Vol. 33, No. 51 Serving: — ★ Black Mountain ★ Swannanoa ★ Montreat ★ Ridgecrest 15 cents per copy Two breakins investigated nu investigations are er way for larcenies in :k Mountain last week, et Bill Stafford of the ck Mountain Police said e are no suspects at this t in the breaking and ■ring and larceny of about worth of property from the denck Gordon residence to Byrd Rd. September 25. re are no suspects at this e. Stafford said, olice have a description of rson thought to have taken illfold containing $150 in cash and two credit cards from the purse of an employee of Burnette* Appliances on September 30. No suspects have been questioned at this time. Police answered 69 caiu last week. They responded to three traffic accidents and assisted the State Patrol on two. They issued six traffic citations, transported one to Detox and assisted Black Mountain Fire Department and the Sheriff* Police. Plant refutes odor link by Dan Ward e manager of Winston ng and Finishing Plant in inanoa has said that the t has not been cited as lucing odorous em iors. .... ... . ... 'on Fuller, plant lager, said that the rton plant was unfairly ped with two others as ucing odors in an article e September 29 edition of S'ews. Her did admit that the t produced black smoke isions for a period of about 30 minutes when a boiler malfunctioned. That malfunction was corrected within a week, he said. Fuller noted that the plant has been recipient of the Clean Air Award given by the North Carolina Lung Association. The Regional Air Pollution Control Board has asked Fuller to attend a meeting to “discuss emmissions problems in the Valley,’ he said. However, Winston has not been singled out for any emmissions violations, he added. The bleakness of the high mountains is a reminder that v/inter is on its way. (David Peele) Never routine for firemen by Clint W Miami Bd. note: The following article to a narration of the evento that took place daring three! nighto and two days at the Black Mountain Fire Department (Station 4). The events or lack of them, should aot be considered as “typical.’ STATION FOUR: NO DAY IS 1MI Station Four itself. housing both the Black Mountain Fire Department and the E.M.T. crews of car four of the Buncombe County Ambulance Service, is spacious and comfortably appointed. Life at Station Four is an unlikely juxtaposition of monotony and crisis. IV scene Friday night Is Ducks free from snow, snarls by Dan Ward IS gonna be a long, hard Iter, ftiat will the poor birdies do n? tieyll fly to the South Pith worms in their mouths nd tuck their heads under ir wings The poor things! o goes the song. But though st ducks do not fly south n Black Mountain, they have little excuse to tuck their heads under their wings and become poor thing* With some labor and a great deal of care on the part of the town street crew, Lake Tomahawk ducks now have a refuge from winter weather and hungry dogs. Harold Dotson explained that the duck house, located near the clubhouse, was made from the former bar-b que shelter boxed in with plywood. The street crew cut the shelter off from land with a chain-link fence. The fence serves the triple purpose of keeping dogs, drunks and overzealous duck-watchers from bothering the ducks. The shelter was built as much to protect town em ployees as the ducks. In the past, Dotson and co-worker Woody Timmerman risked their lives to rescue ducks stuck in the ice near the middle of the lake. I | HAROLD DOTSON, duck caller Woody Timmerman and Leslie Russel...and friend (Dan Ward) “We went out after them in a boat-just slid along on the ice like a sled,’ Dotson said. After getting the ducks loose, the pair found that the boat had become frozen to the ice. “The boat froze down so we had to rock it to get it loose. Then it broke through the ice. It about scared me to death,' Dotson said. “We had to use a shovel to break the ice ahead of us,“ .Timmerman added. "Thank goodness that now the Redheads (Scova ducks) are keeping the mallards to shore,Dotson said. “Even if onedoesgetstuckintheice.it wont be in the middle of the lake.’ In an effort to keep the ducks close to the shelter, street employees have been feeding than cracked corn there two or three times per week. “This winter well have to feed them every day,’ Dotson said. They wont be able to get any insects then.’ “I hope people will help us feed them this winter. They do belong to the community, not us,’Dotson said. There are now 70 birds at the lake, including seven new born ducklings and some geese that appeared over night. Dotson said children love to feed the ducks. “There was one little girl,lie said,“she was holding a loaf of bread up and all the ducks gathered around. When she saw all those ducks coming at her she started yelling ‘Mama; Dotson said. “They wont hurt you though,' he added. The ducks antics can keep an adult fascinated for hours, too. * “These are about the screwiest bunch of ducks IVe ever seen,’Dotson said. one of domestic tranquility. Harry Oaks is preparing pork chops, rice, biscuits and gravy in the kitchen-a kitchen big enough to make any housewife envious. Fire Chief Mac Kirkpatrick and E.M.T. Bill Jones are watching “Chico and the Man’on a large color television donated by the Moose Club. Abruptly, the ringing of the telephone breaks into the canned laughter of the situation comedy. There is a 10-50, a wreck on US 70, Just east of town. A tractor-trailer and a car are involved. Quickly, the E.M.T.t bound down the stairs to their am bulance, leaving Chief Kirk patrick to watch the station and the stove. Time out - 8:37. Flashing lights and wailing siren slice through traffic. The ambulance eases past the line of backed-up cars and stops where the crowd of ghoulish sight-seers have con centrated. The scene of recent violence is draped in a light, misty rain. Hie individual droplets seem to grasp and hold the red light of bunting flares and flashing beacons, creating an eerie scarlet glow about the wreck. A child* screams of pain and '"ar cut through the drone of the crowd* murmers. The two E.M.T.S dart to the two blanket-draped bodies, each attends to a different victim. One of the victims, a four year-old boy, has suffered lacerations over the eye and on the back of the head. The boy* father, after being placed in the ambulance on a stret cher, refuses to go to the hospital. He is released to the custody of the police. The mother of the child arrives and accompanies her frightened son to the hospital. With Harry in the back of the ambulance with the victim and his mother, Bill drives fast but without reckless haste to Memorial Mission Hospital. At one point during the trip the siren is used to help keep the child, who has a concussion, from falling asleep. The ambulance pulls into Station Four at 10:35. Harry goes upstairs to put the biscuits in the oven. The rest of the evening is uneventful. Everyone goes to bed in the large bunk-room about 12:30. Sleep is shattered by the loud ringing of the special phone next to the firemans’ bed. A truck has over-turned on Highway 9 south of Black Mountain. There are no in juries but a fire truck is requested in case the gasoline tank ruptures. Groggy eyes consult the clock. It is 3:10 a.m. The early morning air awakens you by the time the firetruck arrives at the scene of the accident. The gas tank hasnt been ruptured. The truck is towed away without incident. The fire truck is back in the station by 3:49 a.m. Saturday the tedium, the boredom is so intense that a man finds himself reaching into his pocket time and time again to draw out his change and count it; as if it might multiply or decrease by itself. Television shows fade into one another. The two E.M.T.t on duty must leave “Starsky and Hutch’ to transport a drunk complaining of chest pains to Memorial Mission Hospital. Everyone goes to sleep about 1:30 a.m. During the night the phone rings at least six times. All the calls are on the police line. No calls for an ambulance or firetruck. It must almost be a nightmare for fireman Charles Shook - no action and no sleep. Sunday morning, Gary Bartlett comes in to replace Shook and Austin Burgess and “Peanut’Goodman come in to replace Ricky Patton and Thomas Lee. Sunday, if it is at all possible, is more boring than Saturday. The monotony is exhausting. That night, after everyone goes to bed, not even the phone breaks the dull routine of the day. It must take a special breed of man, a unique temperment to be able to adjust to the harsh extremes of inactivity and emergency that are routine, or 10-43, at Station Four. But then I doubt any day is truly routine at Station Four’ - WILLIAM MICHAEL BEGLEY has announced for the office of alderman In Black Mountain. He la a member of Floyd O. Brock, Attorneys at Law in Asheville. JEC head fired by Dan Ward Bill Noland, former director of the Juvenile Evaluation Center (JEC) in Swannanoa, said he was “shocked’over his firing last week by Dr. Sarah Morrow, Secretary of the Department of Human Resources. Noland, who has been director of the JEC since 1975, was given notice of his ter mination in Raleigh on Sep tember 28. No reason was given for his termination at that time, and no hearing was made availsble-as is legal under a recent amendment to the State Personnel Act. According to Dr. Morrow, Noland was fired because he failed to obey a directive that all state employees living on the JEC grounds be charged for utilities. She also said that Noland had failed to report an incident in which a girl at JEC He added that the incident in which the girl was struck by another resident with a broom was relatively minor, making it unnecessary to report to division authorities. He noted that the parents were con tacted and the incident recorded in the girli record. Noland is being replaced by Robert Atkinson, who is assistant director of the Division of Youth Services of the Department of Human Resources. Noland said he hopes to obtain another position within state services, was assaulted. Noland replied that he was told that it would not be necessary to charge for utilities until after JEC housing is insulated. He added that deductions for rent are taken out of emplbyees’ checks. wtM&B&aaaas&ira —. star ~ 8EKK7v1Jki ■ >' ■' Troubled system Part two: by Du Ward Ed. Note-Thla arttcfe la aecMd in a aerie* cu aJcl Mountain! water problem* and possible solutions. This article will provide an l—igi»* into what shape the water system is in now. Black Mountain k water comes from a 515 acre watershed in Dunsmore Cove. There is a main collection reservoir and a smaller supplementary reservoir in Dunsmore Cove that were created with WPA labor during the Depression. A chlorine tor and pump are also located there. Until construction of 1-40 caused it to be shut down, a 165,000 gallon storage reservoir, Hemphill Reser voir, was used to guarantee a backup water storage. At this time, four small storage reservoirs with pumps are in use. They are the Jeanle Ave., Walker Cove, McCoy Cove and Sky High Reser voirs. Each is accompanied by an individual pump that p»n« water to areas with inadequate pressure. The town maintains all but McCoy Cove Reservoir. Ail of those reservoirs overflow occasionally or have poor venting. At the time a Cummings Engineering study was done in 1975, it was found that the town had leas than one-half of the recommended amount of storage for emergencies or fire. Since then, the Hemphill Reservoir has been shut down. In addition to inadequate storage, the study showed that inadequate pressure for firefighting existed because many of the towni water lines A.F. TYSON hai announced (or the office of alderman la Black Mountaia. Tyson, an incumbent, manages Tyson Furniture in Black Mountain. diameter. The burying of a 10 inch line up State Street and a 10 inch line up the new NC 9 spur have alleviated some pressure pruMems but a. ' ' only ’ he first part of the first phase suggested by Cummings to provide adequate water to the town. Town Manager Jon Creighton has estimated that it will coat »1 million to complete phase one of Cummings’ suggestions. At this time, main lines in Black Mountain are primarily six inch, and spur lines are two tu^h, Twi, n ii lines do not supply enough \ pressure far firefighting; The Craigmont Community, in particular, is fed completely by two inch lines, except those households getting Asheville water. There are no fire hydrants there. Water grants under study by Dan Ward Baaed on talks with Cum mings Engineering last week, Town Manager Jon Creighton said he will meet with Asheville water represen tatives to discuss the probability of Black Mountain buying Asheville water full time in the future. Creighton said that earlier recommendations made by Cummings, in their study of the town* water system, have become modified by the Clean Water Act passed earlier this year. Under the act, all municipal water systems must utilize filtered water. To date, the act hasnotbeen enforced in Black Mountain, which has no filtration plant. “There is no way Black Mountain can go out and build a $1.5 million filtration plant,’ Creighton said. He said that the only viable option for Black Mountain is to plan on eventually buying filtered water from Asheville. Creighton is also studying a plan to apply for Community DON HOEFUNC ha« an nounced for the office of alderman hi Black Mountain. Hoe fling, an incumbant, la employed by Kearfott in Swanaaaoa. Development funds from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to upgrade the water system in the Craigmont Community. At this time, houses there are supplied by two inch lines. There are no fire hydrants. If the town could obtain $100,000 of $400,000 in funds available to this regions in April 1978, the town would be able to provide six inch lines and 12 fire hydrants. The grant, in addition to improving service to that area, would serve “seed money’ tr frdlitate getting other grants, improve the towns firefighting capac bilities and would make a sound hookup with the Asheville system easier. If the town could obtain the Community Development grant, Creighton said, it would facilitate obtaining later grants from the Ap palachian Regional Council for up to $500,000 and a Clean Water Bond to help build one million gallon reservoir and provide feeder lines throughout the town. RUTH BRANDON Ui announced for the office of alderwoman la Black Mountain. Mr*. Brandon, aa Incumbent, operate* Black Mountain Hardware with her buabaad, LaWreace.