Sulphur Springs News-Telegram (Sulphur Springs, Tex.), Vol. 102, No. 108, Ed. 1 Tuesday, May 6, 1980 Page: 1 of 12
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Sulphur Springs
VOL. 102—NO. 108.
Nmis-Sclrgram
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Tuesday
15 C«nt*
MAY 6, 1980.
That kind of day
Th* skies were mostly cloudy Tuesday and the lake murky, but
the temperature was warm and it seemed like a good day tor'
sitting alone, fishing, and just pondering the mysteries of the
world. As the temperature continues to warm, more and more
people are finding a day on the water or shore seems just the
right thing to do as Lake Sulphur Springs was dotted with boats
and the banks swelled with fishermen, women and children.
-Staff Photo
New shopping center
site action expected
By JOE WOOSLEY
News Telegram Staff
The Piazza Shopping Center on College
Street on the east side of Interstate 30,
which was revealed without formal, an-
nouncement locally several months ago, is
expected to show movement soon.
R.B. (Buck) Thomason of Sulphur
Springs, who is the local representative of
the European investors planning the
shopping center with the controlled mall
concept and adjacent town houses, hosted
37 men and women from The Netherlands,
Belguim, Holland and Germany during the
weekend in Sulphur Springs.
Thomason said Tuesday that
engineering designs were being prepared.
He said that construction of utilities and
streets in the area were expected to begin
within a few months.
Thomason received preliminary plans
on the project from Houston Tuesday.
Pizzini Price of Sulphur Springs sold a
36-acre tract on the south side of College
Street to the Dutch development firm and
later exhibited a Dutch-language
newspaper which gave some of the facts
about the project.
The newspaper, according to a local
translation, indicated that a group of
Dutch investors put in minimum in-
vestments of $75,000 each on the project.
The article said that all shares were sold
within two weeks of the initial visit to
Sulphur Springs. <
The investment group is known as ALP
— American l^and Program.
Some top soil from the proposed building
site has been removed in recent months,
with the previous owner having made this
arrangement, it was reported.
The initial article indicated that two
office buildings also are being considered
for the project.
The runoff voting game...
...Open-and-shut case
By JIMMOORE
News-Telegram Staff
The problem is that Texas has a closed
primary — except that sometimes it’s
open.
If you were one of the 245 people who
voted in the Republican primary Saturday
and had planned to vote in the Democratic
runoff, you’ve got a problem.
According to the Texas Election Code,
you can not vote in the Democrat’s runoff
unless you voted in the Democratic
primary or just didn’t vote Saturday at all.
A closed primary is one in which only
registered members of the party may
participate in that party’s primary. An
open primary is where any registered
voter can vote in any primary.
Technically, what we’ve got is a closed
primary but in practice it’s open. It’s
simple — right?
“Texas voters may vote in any primary
as long as they have not voted in the
primary of another party; the only
practical sense in which Texas has a
closed primary is that once a voter has
registered his party affiliation by voting in
a primary, he cannot in the same year
participate in the party affairs (the runoff
primary or the conventions) of another
party,” according to “Understanding
Texas Politics” by Kraemer, Crain and
Maxwell.
A quick visit to the office of County Clerk
Mary Attlesey verified the same.
Mrs. Attlesey says that’s the same in-
formation contained in Article 13.01a in
paragraph 7 of the Texas Election Code.
Zone board approves
office for specialist
Drug raid
nets five
WINNSBORO - Police Chief Gary
Lile reports that raids by the Wood
County Narcotics Team Monday night
resulted in five persons being
arrested and a quantity of controlled
substances being confiscated.
“We’ve got five so far and we’ll
probably be getting some more
today,” Lile said.
He explained that the county-wide
narcotics team, made up of officers
from all law enforcement agencies in
the county, hit several locations
during the night raid.
Lile said that over a pound of a
substance believed to be marijuana
and approximately, 100 pills were
confiscated in the raids.
He said that two of those arrested
were Winnsboro residents and that
three lived just outside town.
Lile said the persons arrested had
not. been formally charged as of
Monday morning.
Members of the Planning and Zoning
Commission approved the placement of a
temporary building on the Memorial
Hospital grounds and called for a public
hearing on the closing of a portion of
Longino Street at their meeting Monday
night.
Ed Rosemond, of Cannon Craft, told the
members of the commission that the firm
wanted to close a portion of Longino^to
provide for an expansion to the facility.
He said that the firm plans a 40,000-
square-foot addition to the plant as well as
tearing down an old house now used as a
paintshop.
Rosemond said that the plans included
provisions for access in case of fire and
that only a portion of Longino would be
closed.
Perry Bradley made the motion for a
public, hearing to be held in June on the
change and Joe Moore asked that the city
attorney be present at that meeting for
legal assistance.
Glenn Kenley, Memorial Hospital ad-
ministrator, presented the request that a
temporary building be placed on the
hospital’s 15-acre clinic development area.
He said that because of the tight money
situation, the new opthamologist, Dr. Phil
White, was unable to obtain financing to
build his clinic.
Kenley said the temporary building
would be next to a permanent structure
and that its placement had already been
approved by the hospital board.
The temporary building will be allowed
for a maximum of 18 months from June 1
British troops free 19 hostages
Assault ends siege
LONDON (AP) — British commandos
swung down ropes from the roof of the
Iranian Embassy and in a paralyzing hail
of explosives and gunfire killed three
Arab-Iranian terrorists, captured two
others and rescued 19 hostages to end a
six-day siege.
“It’s a victory, lads!” shouted a British
hostage, BBC soundman Sim Harris,
grinning and punching the air.
Home Secretary William Whitelaw said
the daring assault Monday night, ordered
after the terrorists murdered two Iranian
hostages and threatened to kill another
every half-hour, showed “we in Britain are
not prepared to tolerate terrorism.' ’
Whitelaw said he ordered the raid after
the gunmen dumped the body of the em-
bassy's press attache, Abbas Lavasani, 25,
out the embassy’s front door shortly after 7
p.m.
“It was clear that failure to take further
action was going to cost lives,” the home
secretary told a news conference.
Six or eight commandos from the
Special Air Services set off a deafening
explosion from the roof of the five-story
town house just off Hyde Park at 7:23 p.m.
Apparently it was a “stun grenade” —
used by the West Germans to capture a
hijacked airliner in Somalia in 1977 — to
immobilize the gunmen. The commandos
lowered themselves on ropes to the second
floor of the building, both front and back,
threw more explosives in the windows and
then stormed in with automatic weapons
blazing. At least eight of the men were
inside within 40 seconds.
Flames and smoke poured from the
building.
Newspaper reports said highly sensitive
microphones had been lowered down
chimneys of the building to pinpoint the
location of the hostages.
What it all boils down to is that if you
voted Republican in the primary, you
won’t be able to vote in the runoff without
taking a chance on going to jail and-or
paying a fine for breaking the law — a law
punishible under Article 240 of the Texas
Penal Code.
The emergence of the Republican Party
in Texas and in Hopkins County is taking
many politicians and interested voters
back to the civics or political science
textbooks.
under conditions imposed by the hospital
board.
Kenley said that Dr. White is to arrive in
Sulphur Springs in June and will open his
office in July.
He said that the new opthamologist will
build an office big enough for two doctors
and that the temporary building will be
placed so that the construction of that new
office area can be undertaken while still
utilizing the temporary structure.
Members of the commission approved
that action for an 18 month period.
Noisy storm
almost dry
Lightning flashed across the early
morning skies and the thunder rolled
Tuesday but the rain just barely made
it.
For all of the noise the quick moving
thunderstorm left only .04 inches of
rain.on the ground Tuesday morning,
according to the official observation
station in Sulphur Springs.
Although the early morning rain left
very little moisture as it passed,
water treatment personnel opened the
flood gates on Lake Sulphur Springs
for about an hour and 15 minutes
Tuesday to lower the level of the lake.
According to a water treatment
facility spokesman, the lake is still
about a foot high even after the
opening of the flood gates.
“The lake is full not so much
because we have had a lot of rain in
Sulphur Springs, but because there
has been heavy rain south of us. We
weren’t affected at all until the runoff
from White Oak began to flow into the
lake,” the spokesman said.
The National Weather Service
forecast reads the same for Wed-
nesday as it does for the remainder of
the week.
The forecast calls for partly cloudy
skies, warm temperatues and a
chance of thundershowers. Daytime
high temperatures should be in the 80s
with overnight lows in the mid 50s to
lower 60s.
The mercury climbed to 84 degrees
Monday and dropped to 63 early
Tuesday morning as the storm
rumbled through. At 8 a.m. Tuesday
the temperature was 89 and by noon
the mercury had risen to 80 degrees.
The 19 persons freed included 16
Iranians, five of them women, and three
British men. Two of the hostages were
operated on for gunshot wounds. Their
condition was not known. Others were
treated for cuts or shock. But most of them
were released from St. Stephens Hospital
in Chelsea.
None of the commandos was injured, but
one of the captured terrorists was reported
badly wounded.
The Britons rescued were a clerk on the
embassy staff, a policeman on duty there
when the terrorists captured the building
last Wednesday, and the BBC soundman
who with his producer was applying for a
visa.
The producer was among five hostages
released earlier.
Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who
watched the rescue as it was broadcast
live on television, visited the commandos
and congratulated them.
Iranian President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr
sent a message thanking the British police
for their "intelligent” handling of the
siege. Tehran Radio also broadcast a
message from him to the Iranian people
saying: “The valiant resistance of your
sons at the embassy in London has borne
sweet fruit. We did not surrender and won
victory.”
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s
revolutionary government refused to
negotiate with the terrorists, who were
from the ethnic Arab majority in
Khuzestan, the oil province in southern
Iran. The Arabs are waging a campaign of
sabotage to push their demand for
autonomy or independence from the
Persian-dominated government in
Tehran, and the gunmen demanded the
release of 91 Arabs imprisoned in
Khuzestan.
“It was fast, amazing, like something
you see on TV," said banker Morley Smith,
a neighbor of the embassy Who watched
and photographed the assault through a
back alley.
"My initial reaction, when the bomb
went off and the firing started was, ‘My
God, if anybody comes out of there un-
scathed, it’ll be an absolute miracle’.”
Earlier in the siege, the terrorists
threatened to blow up the building and kill
ail those inside, and when the first ex-
plosions occurred about 10 seconds apart,
one reporter in the street in front gasped,
“My God, they’ve done it.”
The Daily Express reported that as the
commandos poured in, one of the terrorists
aimed an automatic rifle at the head of the
hostage policeman, Constable Trevor
Lock. But Lock grabbed the gunman’s legs
and wrestled him to the ground, and one of
the commandos killed him with a machine-
gun burst, the Express said.
Lock was overpowered by the gunmen at
the outset of the siege but managed to hide
his service revolver under his uniform the
entire time, police said. He decided not to
use the revolver because he thought it
would be impossible to kill more than two
of the terrorists, thereby risking the lives
of the other hostages.
Chris Cramer, the BBC producer who
was freed last Thursday, said in a TV
interview the Arabs were heavily armed
with hand grenades and had at least one
machine gun.
He said one terrorist “kept playing
with” a grenade.
“He had his Anger through the pin the
whole time. They must have had a couple
of grenades in each pocket,” Cramer said.
“My God, those men are brave,” Morley
said, and reported that his knees were
shaking and heart was pounding as he kept
his binoculars trained on the five-story
townhouse just off Hyde Park.
The drama started at 4:39 p.m. when
police reported “two or three shots”
coming from the direction of the embassy
which Arab-Iranian terrorists seized last
Wednesday.
“My wife had heard that somebody was
killed, so I thought I’d go out and see what
was going on,” said Smith.
Firefighter killed as
blaze out of control
MIO, Mich. (AP) — A fire deliberately
set for the benefit of a rare songbird had
blackened 30 square miles of forestlands
by early today, killing one firefighter,
destroying dozens of homes and forcing
about 1,000 people to flee.
U.S. Forest Service workers lit the fire
Monday morning, trying to prepare
breeding grounds for the rare “Bird of
Fire,” the tiny blue-and-yellow Kirtland’s
warbler whose only summer habitat is the
Huron National Forest. But Forest Service
recreation officer Robert Lockhardt said
winds gusting up to 25 mph fanned the
flames out of control.
"The conditions were right when we
started the prescribed bum about four
miles south of Mio, but the wind picked up
after an hour and a half and the flames
headed east," said Lockhardt.
The fire spread east from Mio in Oscoda
County eastward toward Lake Huron
through Alcona County and to the south
through Ogemaw County. Lockhardt said
at least 25,000 acres of forestland had been
consumed by 7 a.m., when the fire was 75
percent under control.
One Forest Service biological
technician, James L. Swiderski, 29, of
Alto, was killed. Authorities said ap-
parently he was overcome by smoke while
operating a tractor digging fire lines.
A second person, identified by ofticials
only as a motorcyclist, was hospitalized in
fair condition today with bums.
Lockhardt said at least 200 firefighters
were battling the Huron blaze, including
crews from Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Additional manpower was on its way from
Indiana and Missouri, he said.
State police evacuated the entire
population of South Branch — about 1,000
persons - and warned residents in Jose
Lake and Chain Lake they also should be
prepared to leave, said Sgt. Gary Gokey.
At least 33 homes and cabins were
destroyed plus 42 sites at the Mack Lake
campground, he said.
Some 250 evacuees at Hale High School
were allowed to return to their homes
about 11 p.m. Monday, said a Red Cross
spokeswoman. Others continued to wait
out the blaze at the ‘ VFW Hall and Lupton
Town Hall, officials said.
The Kirtland’s warblers, which num-
bered 422 at last count, thrive only in jack
pine stands that grow when the heat from
fire opens jack pine cones and releases
seeds, forest service officials said. Fire
also prepares the forest floor for their
growth.
The tiny yellow-and-blue Kirtland’s
Warblers have not arrived from their
winter home in the Bermudas; they aiy
due in late May or early June. The entire
population lives in the Huron National
Forest during summer, said Bill
Lowenstein, a spokesman for the
Department of Natural Resources.
The fire would not necessarily make the
area uninhabitable for the birds unless all
the trees weYe lost, said Audubon Society
spokesman Wilbur T. Bull.
New jail price tag set at $1 million
Members of the Hopkins County Com-
missioners Court heard from two ar-
chitects Monday about planning for a new
jail- ,
, Both designers, one from Texarkana and
one from Dallas, indicated that the cost of
a new jail would be between $80 and $100
per square foot for a new facility, based on
current rates.
County Judge Joe Pogue said the county
has eliminated plans for additional office
space to be included at the jail facility,
thus raising the cost per square foot.
Joe Thomas, of the firm of Moore-
Thomas and Emberton, Ipc. in Texarkana,
said the high cost of unique jail equipment
is what makes facility so expensive.
He said a 10,000-square-foot facility
would be required to house 30-35 prisoners
and that at present costs it would be
around $1,000,000.
However, he said it would be about 2%-
years before the building would be com-
pleted if planning began immediately.
He said that with the present inflation
rate increasing costs 13 to 14 percent per
year, the cost coqld well be $120-$130 per
square foot by the time the jail was ac-
tually built.
Pogue said that the previous cost
estimate of $88 per square foot was based
on additional office space being included
and that office space footage brought the
total costs down considerably while the
present (dans of only a jail with a
minimum of office space for the Sheriff’s
Department resulted in the higher cost per
s(ju&r6 foot*
Sheriff John E. (Junior) Tittle said that
what he needs is a “big safe, secure jail
with a minimum of staff needed to operate
it.”
He said he felt that the county would be
able to keep the present jail open “if we
can show them (Texas Commission on Jail
Standards) that we’re trying.”
But Tittle agreed that the present jail
capacity of 10 is too small for present
needs and will be even less adequate as the
county grows.
Pogue told those present that the county
was in a position to ‘ ‘spend about $20,000 on
nothing really,” citing the need to improve
the plumbing at the jail — only one step
toward repairing the facilty which will
have to eventually be replaced.
Tittle said that approximately 140
changes have been made since the first jail
inspection some time ago, but that most of
those were inexpensive or at low cost
“Now we’re at the point of the expensive
items,” Tittle said.
Pogue said that the feasibility of a
regional jail is again being considered and
that he will be checking with other officals
after the primary runoff elections are held
to see if other counties in the area might be
interested.
Some commission members, Pogue and
Tittle left early Tuesday to view new jails
at Palo Pinto, Hood and Bosque Counties.
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Keys, Clarke. Sulphur Springs News-Telegram (Sulphur Springs, Tex.), Vol. 102, No. 108, Ed. 1 Tuesday, May 6, 1980, newspaper, May 6, 1980; Sulphur Springs, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth823604/m1/1/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Hopkins County Genealogical Society.