Banner Graphic, Volume 12, Number 99, Greencastle, Putnam County, 5 January 1982 — Page 3

Louisville firm fined $62,500 Ralston guilty in sewers blast

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) - . U.S. District Judge Charles M. Allen fined Ralston Purina Co. a maximum $62,500 after it pleaded guilty to a four-count indictment stemming from sewer explosions in Old . Louisville. Ralston entered its plea Monday and a spokesman said it did so "in order to curtail lengthy and costly legal proceedings." More than $325 million in civil suits have been filed against the company as a result of the Feb. 13 blasts, which disrupted the lives of thousands and caused at least $18.4 million in damage to public property. The federal indictment, returned Dec. 30. charged Ralston with one count of introducing a flammable and explosive material into the sewer system,

Music marks funeral tribute to Hoagy

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) They played his music, sang his swing-era songs and quoted Hoagy Carmichael. The Hoosier-born songwriter’s final rites Monday afternoon were more of a concert than a funeral. Born Hoagland Howard Carmichael Nov. 22, 1899, in Bloomington, the composer of 135 songs and movie actor died Dec. 27 at Rancho Mirage, Calif., where he lived. The service was postponed more than a week so it could be at his alma mater in the room named for him on the Indiana University campus. After the service, he was buried next to his parents in Rose Hill Cemetery on the westside of Bloomington. About 400 people came to Carmichael’s funeral in the grand foyer of the university’s Musical Arts Center. Nearly 100 people stood for the 90-minute service for the 19261 U Law School graduate who donated SIOO,OOO to the center. At the start of the service, six music professors played such Carmichael classics as “Heart and Soul,” putting more smiles than tears on the faces in the crowd. They also played a special piece, “Serenade for Gabriel,” written by Carmichael for his own funeral. Estelle Walters, a housemother for Sigma Kappa sorority, was among the curious who strained to get a glimpse of the crimson-colored roses and cream-colored mums sent by

FAA probing fatal crash at Fort Wayne

• FORT WAYNE, Ind. (AP) - No immediate report is expected on the cause of the crash es a twin-engine aircraft carrying four Ohioans home from a holiday outing. • Two of those aboard were killed Monday when the Cessna Skymaster 337 plunged nose first into a field near the Fort Wayne airport. Killed were the plane’s pilot and owner, James Horn, 31, and Jan Estep, 27,

17-month nurses' strike continues

ASHTABULA, Ohio (AP) Nurses who rejected a contract offer that would have ended their record 17-month strike say they are eager to return to the bargaining table, but hospital administrators say there is little to discuss. About 100 unionized nurses striking Ashtabula General Hospital turned aside a package Monday that would have made them among the highest paid nurses in Ohio and returned them to their old jobs. “A little money and the jobs we already had just wasn’t enough after 17 months,” Ashtabula General Nurses Association President Mary Runyon said after the secret vote. “The bottom line of all this is that it’s a union-busting situation,” said Kathy Keller, past local president who led the strike. Hospital administrator Floyd Farley said he was “appalled by the (union’s) disregard for the well-being of this community.” . “The hospital has addressed in this proposal the one real issue that has separated the hospital and the nurses the return of the nurses’ jobs,” Farley said. The 535-day walkout already holds the record as the longest

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one count of failure to report the release to the environment of a hazardous substance to federal authorities and two counts of discharging the industrial solvent hexane into the Ohio River. James Reed, manager of corporate information for Raison in St. Louis, Mo., said in his statement that the discharge was accidental. Prior to sentencing, U.S. Justice Department attorneys Raymond W. Mushal and Ann P. Gailis said federal prosecutors were prepared to prove that the discharge of hexane, used in processing soybeans at Ralston’s Louisville soybean extraction plant, resulted from company employees’ continued operation

both of Toledo. Two other Toledo residents, Shirley Cassabon, 34, and Pamela Schwartz, 28, were hospitalized in serious condition. Investigators from the National Traffic Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration were on the scene Monday but will not publish the cause of the crash for some time, according to Bill Betson,

by nurses, according to the American Nurses Association. Union bargainers said they would seek a return to negotiations “as soon as possible.” Farley said bargainers will meet with the nurses but will not agree to demands for a modifed union shop and a voice in staffing levels of registered and licensed practical nurses. Most of the striking nurses, who call themselves the “Ashtabula 100,” have taken other jobs since the walkout began July 21, 1980. Only a few are experiencing financial difficulty, said Joan Kalhorn, a lawyer for the Ohio Nurses Association, parent group of the local union. A national shortage of nurses that has made it easy for strikers to find work also has hurt the hospital’s recruiting efforts. Ashtabula General, the only hospital in this northeastern Ohio city of 23,000, will reopen 16 beds Wednesday, increasing to 115 the number of available spots at the 234-bed hospital. Eight of the hospital’s 10 divisions will be operating, Farley said. “You have to remember that we were closed down bv this strike when it happened.”

of a plant known to be malfunctioning. They said they also would prove that there was inadequate maintenance of the plant over a number of years, and defective design of the separation basin intended to keep hexane out of the sewer system. The basin, built in 1947, was not updated by Ralston despite subsequent expansions of the extraction plant and enactment of laws and regulations prohibiting discharge of flammable and explosive materials into public sewers, the prosecutors said. They said as much as 18,000 gallons of the explosive solvent were lost into the sewer, “only a small fraction of which would have been required to cause the

President and Nancy Reagan. Mrs. Walters added her own bit of lore about Carmichael and his IU days. “I’m told Hoagy used to play the piano at our house when he was dating a Sigma Kappa girl. I’ve been trying for years to get it restored, and now the girls are ready,” she said. Highlight of the musical tribute was Carmichael’s “Stardust,” sung by Sylvia McNair, a graduate music student from Mansfield, Ohio. The dream-like song is especially dear to IU alumni because Carmichael composed it at a college hangout. Chancellor Herman B Wells, who attended IU when Carmichael did, related a story about Carmichael’s worldwide popularity. He recalled lounging once beside a pool in Lagos, Nigeria, beneath a sky of fleecy clouds. Wells said he told the pool attendant, “That is a buttermilk sky the kind a friend of mine in college wrote a song about.” When Wells remarked to the attendant he probably hadn’t heard of that song, the man just grinned and broke into a full rendition of “Ole Buttermilk Skythe chancellor said. “Truly Hoagy’s songs are known wherever folks sing, and they have touched the hearts and inspired the feelings of untold millions,” Wells added.

chief of the airport police and crash fire rescue unit. The plane was headed for Fort Wayne’s Baer Field. Its last stop was for fuel in Grand Island, Neb., Betson said. In Chicago, a spokeswoman for the regional FAA office said the plane was enroute to Toledo from Nebraska after the pilot requested a change in flight plan because of poor weather at Toledo Express Airport.

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explosions and damage which occurred on Feb. 13. The Ralston statement noted that “consolidated civil proceedings seeking damages from the company are still pending.” “On the night of Feb. 12,1981, and the following morning, during a plant startup attempt, a series of events occurred, including malfunctioning equipment and freezing temperatures which led to the spill... “When the company suspected that its solvent hexane may have seeped into the sewer system, it called the Metropolitan Sewer District, which investigated and found no evidence of any hazardous substance. Shortly thereafter, the explosions occurred.”

Betson said he first learned about the crash when an area resident called to report the sounds of a low-flying plane and then the sounds of a crash in a nearby farm field. He said it appeared the aircraft came down through two lines of trees. “All that was intact was the fuselage, and we Iliad to use forcible entry to remove the passengers.”

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The camera angle and use of a telephoto lens give the appearance that this skier might have been skiing the tree limbs at Monarch Pass, Colo. He was one of a few skiers who took advantage of heavy snow in the Rocky Moun-

Flooding hits California Violent weather claims 13 lives

By ANDY O’CONNELL Associated Press Writer Mud hosed loose by an unrelenting rainstorm washed into California homes while sleet chattered on Northeastern rooftops, snow piled up in the Midwest, and the South crackled with thunderstorms and tornadoes. At least 13 people died in weather-related accidents Monday. Up to 16 inches of snow fell on Wisconsin, smacking Milwaukee with its worst snowstorm in 35 years, rain pummeled Ohio, and snow forced schools to close in Illinois and Michigan. Weathermen estimated that 12 inches of rain fell in a 24-hour period near San Francisco. Northbound traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge was halted for four hours because of the flooding. Winds reached 90 mph at the top of the Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co. building in Cleveland, 85 mph on a mountain ridge at Park City ski resort west of Salt Lake City and 60 mph in parts of Illinois and Wisconsin. Thousands of people were for-

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ced from their homes and officials closed schools and highways as record-breaking rain pelted northern California. A six-car Amtrak passenger train derailed in heavy rain at San Pablo, Calif., north of Oakland, injuring 13 people, none seriously. Rescuers had to use rowboats and helicopters to reach the train, since roads in the area were under up to five feet of water, police said. Skiers were stranged in Sierra Nevada lodges where up to 7 feet of snow accumulated. In Seattle, where snow is rare, the steepest streets were closed Monday because of 2 inches of snow and a sheet of ice. Three tornadoes touched down Monday in North Carolina and another hit Canton, Ga.,

Mail-order bishop gets five years

SAN DIEGO (AP) - William E. Drexler, archbishop of the Life Science Church, has been sentenced to five years in prison for conviction in a scheme to sell church memberships as tax-exempt. U.S. District Judge Leland Nielsen also sentenced

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January 5,1982, The Putnam County Banner-Graphic

tains. Others would have done the same, but they couldn't reach ski areas because of closed highways. (AP Laserphoto)

destroying an airplane hangar. At least eight tornadoes touched down in central and northern Alabama and rivers were running above flood level Monday in parts of Georgia, South Carolina and Kentucky. Some parts of New York state were flooded near Lake Erie, which was pushed above flood stage by high winds during an ice storm Monday. Roads in eastern and central New York were strewn with dented and abandoned cars Monday morning as freezing rain frosted roads. At least five people died in storm-related incidents in California, authorities said, including a person who was killed when a house slid off its foundation in Tiburon.

Drexler’s son, William Jr., 27, of Lone Grove, Okla., Monday to two years in prison. The elder Drexler, 49, of Huntington Beach, Calif., was convicted by a jury Nov. 26 on three counts of tax evasion, three of mail fraud, 19 counts of assisting others in evading

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Carey E. Anderson, 61, of Homedale, Idaho was found frozen near his pickup. Five Wisconsin men were reported to have collapsed and died during or after shoveling snow. Homes were abandoned in wealthy parts of northern California, and mud and water churned at 30 mph through the streets of San Rafael. National Guardsmen rescued stranded motorists and boats were used to reach 500 people in Vallejo, where the Lake Chabot reservoir rose menacingly within 2 feet of the rim. “I’m from Chicago,” Susan Rabin said as she phoned the Highway Patrol from a San Francisco bar to see whether she could get home to Mill Valley.

taxes and one of conspiracy to defraud the government. Mail-order ministeries were sold in the Life Science Church for SI,OOO to $4,000 each, and buyers were told their membership would bring tax-exempt status.

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