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VOL. 102 NO. 46
Weekend
Warriors
No More
Reserves Are Mobilized
For Persian Gulf Crisis
Military reserves are no longer weekend warriors
who draw a monthly check from the government but
are an important part of the U.S. defense strength.
Major John Smith III, operations and security offi-
cer of the 812th Transportation Battalion in Charlotte,
speaking at Monday's Veteran's Day ceremony at
Kings Mountain's Mountain Rest Cemetery, said we
will continue to see reserves called into active duty
anytime the U.S. is in an emergency situation such as
the one now existing in the Persian Gulf.
"A lot of people remember the reserves as ‘let's go
out and shoot some hoops on Saturday afternoon’ but
that's not the way it is anymore and not the way it's
been for quite some years," he said.
The President has the authority to call up 200,000
reserves on a "unit by unit" basis and keep them on ac-
tive duty for up to six months as the result of a law
passed during President Carter's administration.
"What we've looked at so far has not been the mass
mobilization that we have come to expect,” he said.
"It's been what militarists call a graduated mobilization
response and involves a lot of different things. One is
the military response, that is unit by unit and not a to-
tal mobilization. Another part of it is economic re-
sponse, that is freezing of assets which we've done to
Iraq, leading to the embargo that we and other United
Nations members have applied. And one is expulsion
of diplomats. We haven't done a lot of that yet but that
uld come."
8
J wy proximately 50,000 reservists have been: called
into active duty in the past two months and more are
being activated every day. Smith said local units stand
ready to go.
"Our battalion is very well trained...a well-prepared
unit," he said. "We stand ready to go. I think it's proba-
bly a matter of when, not if. If things continue as they
are we all will see some duty over there."
Smith, who has served 26 years in the military in an
See Veterans. 9-A
Kings Mountain People
Thursday, November 15, 1990
#
VETERANS DAY PROGRAM - SFC George Crosswhite of the Kings Mountain
National Guard presents the colors as Julie Phillips sings the National Anthem at
Monday's Veterans Day ceremony at Kings Mountain's Mountain Rest Cemetery.
Hospice Lifesaver
Betty Howell was in the first class of volunteers to
be trained to work in the Hospice program in
Cleveland County, and she's still going strong.
For four years she has given her time and her ener-
gies in helping terminally ill persons and their families
live out remaining months and days as fully, comfort-
ably and with as much dignity as possible. And this
year, again, she will help with Hospice's Holiday Food
Sale.
Hospice is a program of care and caring which of-
fers a support team of specially trained volunteers to
assist terminally ill people and their families in many
ways. The team works hand in hand with the person's
physician for the benefit of the patient and at no cost to
those served.
It allows patients, if they wish, to die at home in fa-
miliar surroundings and with loved ones and to remain
more in control of their lives.
"Working as a Hospice volunteer as been a lifesaver
to me," said Betty. "I was injured at work and was just
getting out of a wheelchair when the first Hospice
class started.
"Hospice has just been wonderful for me, working
For Betty Howell
with terminally ill people, you don't have time to wor-
ry about yourself, It's something I need to be doing
right now in my life.
"This is an opportunity for me to serve the Lord and
my fellowman at the same time. We all become one
big family. I have gotten so much from this work, I've
grown spiritually. These patients and their families
have so much faith, for me it's really a humbling and
satisfying experience.
Betty works as a patient-family volunteer in the
Kings Mountain area. "I average about two patients a
year, sometimes more," she said.
During the time she spends with a family, she be-
comes a part of the family and ministers in many ways
to the patient. "Patients talk to you, you're a friend and
a confidant and sometimes they have a need to tell you
things they cannot tell family members. They do this
because they know we don't discuss patients with any-
one, it's all confidential," said Betty.
She admits that sometimes she doesn't realize how
tired she gets, but draws strength from the Lord.
See Howell, 9-A
BETTY HOWELL
KM Herald
To Publish
On Tuesday
Because Thanksgiving falls on
our usual publication date, the
Herald will publish early next
week.
The paper will be published on
Tuesday.
Deadline for women's news,
church news, birthdays, weddings,
anniversaries, etc., will be 5 p.m.
Friday. Deadline for all other news
and sports will be 5 p.m. Monday.
News of meetings and other activi-
ties occurring Monday night will
be accepted until 10 a.m, Tuesday.
Deadline for classified and dis-
play advertisements will be 5 p.m.
Friday.
Anyone needing to be called on for
Thanksgiving advertisements are
encouraged to call the Herald ad-
vertising department at 739-7496.
tion.
SPEAKS AT PARENT FAIR - Dr, Marvin Armstrong of the State
Department of Public Instruction leads a session on curriculum and
testing at Tuesday night's Parent Fair at Kings Mountain Middle
School. Well over 100 parents attended the first annual event which
school officials hope will lead to more parent involvement in educa-
Photo by Jeff Grigg
Kings Mountain Schools’ first
district-wide effort to get parents
more involved in schools was a
huge success.
Jean Thrift, director of pupil
support services, said 137 parents
attended Tuesday night's Parent
Fair at Kings Mountain Middle
School and already teachers are
talking about "doing it again next
year."
Parents took part in various
workshops for two hours and then
heard an inspiring speech by Patsy
Linker, who urged parents to
"make education a family affair."
Most of the work sessions were
led by local educators and included
topics such as child safety, inter-
preting test results, guidance pro-
grams for elementary and middle
school, creative art ideas, and eat-
ing and cooking with your child.
"We were real pleased with the
number of parents that came," Mrs.
Thrift said. "We would like to have
had more but we were still very
pleased. We asked parents to do an
Kings Mountain, N.C.
KM School Lines
Being Discussed
Crowds Small
At First Two
Meetings, More Planned Next Week
Kings Mountain school officials
are holding public meetings to ex-
plain the process for re-districting
of elementary schools, but thus far
the attendance by the public has
been very sparse.
At meetings last week at Grover
and East Schools, only a handful of
people showed up to hear Supt.
Bob McRae and Asst. Supt. Larry
Allen explain the process YSAC, a
private consulting firm of Raleigh,
is using to map homes.
Three more meetings are sched-
uled for next week. McRae said the
public is invited to each one, re-
gardless of which attendance zone
they live in. Meetings will be held
Monday at 7 p.m. at West and
North Schools and Tuesday at 7
p-m. at Bethware.
Last Thursday, McRae led a
meeting at East School, which was
attended by about 20 residents, and
Allen led a meeting at Grover
which drew about 25.
"We felt like the meetings went
very well," McRae said. "We
would have liked to had larger at-
tendance, of course, but the people
who did come were very interested
and asked some pertinent ques-
tions. We hope we at least in-
creased the number of people who
understand the process so if they
are around others who don't under-
stand they can help get the mes-
sage out."
YSAC is a company which was
begun by two N.C. State professors
whose own children went through
re-assignment in the Wake County
Schools.
"They understood the need for
re-districting but felt the Wake
County board was going about it in
a way that was not very objective,
so they developed what they
thought was a better way to do it,"
McRae said. YSAC has helped
several school systems in the
Carolinas go through the re-dis-
tricting process and McRae and
Allen showed a sample map from
another school system which they
helped.
YSAC uses computers to map
residential areas, entering racial in-
formation, distance from schools
and other pertinent data. McRae
said the local board of education
expects a first draft of YSAC's rec-
ommendations in December.
"Then, it will be a matter of
looking at it and seeing if there are
any other qualifications the board
wants to put on it in terms of socio-
economic conditions, and other
things that might impact the plans,"
McRae said. "Then there will be
some refining of plans while, at the
same time, the board works on
transfer policies. We hope it can all
be tied up by March so parents will
have ample opportunity to know
where their child will be assigned."
McRae said the board briefly
discussed the transfer policy at its
TWovember mesting but decided wb
wait until the first phase of the plan
is back to consider it further. He
said work sessions may be sched-
uled to discuss transfers. Currently,
there are 150 elementary students
in Kings Mountain attending
schools in attendance zones other
than the one they live in.
See Meetings, 10-A
Schools Cut Bus Wait Time,
Shorten Routes To Save Fuel
Kings Mountain Schools are tak-
ing steps to save money in fuel
consumption because of recent,
skyrocketing prices but further ac-
tion may be necessary, Supt. Bob
McRae told the board of education
at its monthly meeting Monday
night at the Superintendent's
Office.
However, McRae said he doesn't
expect to see buses stopped be-
cause of the crisis.
"I'm optimistic about our
prospects,” he told the board. "I
don't believe we'll be parking bus-
es. We have to get children to
school. We may have to take mon-
ey from one source and put it into
another source."
McRae said he hopes when the
State Legislature reconvenes in
January it will find ways to come
up with more money to keep the
evaluation after the sessions that
they attended and all of them were
positive. They seemed to enjoy the
sessions."
The majority of parents, repre-
senting 162 students, were parents
of elementary and middle school
students. There were a few high
school parents in attendance. "Most
of the high school parents were
there because they also had ele-
mentary children," Mrs. Thrift said.
"The offerings were geared more to
parents of elementary children. But
we hope to do it again next year
and provide more things of interest
to high school parents.”
While the number one aim of the
fair was to get more parents in-
volved in education, Mrs. Thrift
said it also was used to get parents
to see schools in a positive light.
"Many times we have parents who
only come to school when the chil-
dren are in trouble," she said. "This
offered a positive view of schools.
We had several break times and
served refreshments and parents
bus fleets moving.
"But," he said, "we have seen
the end of the day when we can
stop a school bus at every house."
McRae said bus routes have
been redefined and bus stops have
been designated at .2 mile inter-
vals. Bus warm-up times have been
eliminated beyond the time needed
to operate air brakes properly, idle
time has been eliminated and wait
time at stops have been reduced.
That has resulted in lower fuel con-
sumption.
"We've been able to take some
mileage and time off," he said.
"What we've done has helped but if
we have to go beyond this it could
become uncomfortable."
McRae said the system removed
two buses from its fleet during the
1988-89 school year but, due to re-
See Board, 10-A
1 First KM Schools Parent Fair Huge Success
were able to mingle with staff
members and talk with each other."
Because staff members were
used to conduct many of the ses-
sions, Mrs. Thrift saic: parents were
able to learn more about programs
in Kings Mountain Schools, partic-
ularly the guidance programs.
"We were really pl¢ased with the
fair," she said. "At this point, we
feel it was enough of a success to
do it again."
Mrs. Thrift said the fair was a
"community effort" with area mer-
chants donating door prizes and
other awards, including the grand
prize of a night's stay in Atlanta,
Ga., and also prizes to classrooms
which had the highest percentage
of parents present. Merchants tak-
ing part were Dellinger's Jewelry,
Plonk Brothers, Grandpa's Store,
Cornwell Drug, McGinnis
Department Store, Holiday Inn,
Sub Factory, Sagesport, Mauney
Hosiery and Mountain View
Farms. Bolin's Day Care provided
child care for approximately 50
children.