222 NOME NUGGET
OLDEST NEWSPAPER IN ALASKA—MEMBER ASSOCIATED PRESS
VOL. LIX No. 88 NOME, ALASKA, WEDNESDAY, JULY 24, 1957 P^r Copy—15*
Citv Council
j
Meeting Notes
The Nome City Council at their
meeting Monday evening refused
to accept the school addition as
requested by APW until archi
tectural and mechanical defects
have been corrected and proven
corrected, probably by a winter
test.
As no bids were received from
local sources to tar the roof of
the City Hall, steps will be taken
to obtain this service from some
other source.
There will be no construction
on the Alaska National Guard
Armory until July of 1958, ac
cording to a letter received by the
City from Col. Farmer, command
ing officer of the ANG.
As the city had already paid
$1,900 on a $7,500 option from the
Northern Commercial Co. for the
site of the armory, it was voted
to pay the balance of 5,600, giving
the city full title to the site.
Requests for purchase of city
property were received from Tom
Assila for Lot 36 in Block 33 and
Munz Air Service for Lot 37 in
Block 67 and were referred to
committee.
Insurance for $42,000 was tak
en on the two-room high school
addition to the school now under
construction.
Wallace Mclvor, by resolution,
was appointed to the Nome Coun
cil until the next election, filling
the vacancy created by the resig
nation of Don Hungerford.
The water and sewerage proj
ect was discussed but no action
was taken pending the receipt of
further correspondence and in
formation.
Dodgers Official
Says Team Will
Go West for 1958
JACKSONVILLE, Florida UP—
Emil Bavasi, vice president of the
Brooklyn Dodgers, today told the
Jacksonville Journal the Dodgers
would move from Brooklyn to
Los Angeles for the 1958 season.
Jack Hairston, Journal sports
editor, said he had talked with
Bavasi during a brief visit of the
official here yesterday.
Bavasi was quoted as saying:
“The only reason we’re going
is because we can’t get land for
a new stadium. We would build
the stadium if they would get us
the land but the city fathers are
not going to do that. They are no
longer attempting to woo us into
staying.
“The TV deal is not the big
thing. We could get just as lucra
tive a TV contract in Brooklyn as
in Los Angeles.”
This is the first definite an
nouncement by any Dodger offi
cial the move will be made in
1958.
MARINE OFFICER
| NABBED BY FBI ON
i EMBEZZLING CHARGE
LAS VEGAS, (A*)—A charge of
embezzlement has been filed
against a veteran Marine Corps
finance officer whom the FBI said
has admitted “dipping into the
till” to finance gambling sprees
here.
When Capt. George Henry Will
ers, 38, of Camp Pendleton, Calif.,
was arrested Monday night, all
he had was 75 in rolls of pennies.
Agents said Willers told them
he dropped $13,000 in the casinos
on July 13 and came back Mon
day in an attempt to make good
his looses. Instead, he lost $23,000.
The FBI said a check with
Camp Pendleton showed a short
age of $37,956.40 in the 1st Ma
rine Division disbursing office.
I
Army Wants
Selective Service
More Selective
WASHINGTON, UPS—'The Army
wants the selective service to be
a little more selective, to avoid
“totally inept and unsuitable”
draftees.
It asked Congress yesterday for
authority to set higher mental
standards to escape the “great
expense” of sometimes unsuccess
ful efforts to make soldiers out of
unlikely recruits.
Present law permits the various
! services to reject only the bottom
10 percent of selective service
candidates in the lowest of four
categories. The Army asked the
President be given authority to
let the services increase the re
jection ratio.
In theory, the proposal would
permit the Army to reject up to
90 percent of draft-eligible men
and induct only the cream of the
crop. A Pentagon spokesman said,
however, there was no intention
to go to that extreme.
The Army is the only branch
using tne draft.
Walter Lyon
Remains In
Critical Condition
Mrs. Walter Lyon is at the bed
side of her husband at the MMM
Hospital, having come from her
home in Fairbanks to be with him.
Lyon, of the Lyon Air Service,
was found about 10 miles from
Unalakleet Sunday in his plane
which is reported totally wrecked
and rem'ains in a critical condi
tion from inquiries received.
As there were no witnesses to
the accident which occurred after
he had taken passengers to Ega
vik the cause is not known.
40 Members Of
Fairbanks C of C
Expected Friday
i
Forty members of the Fair
banks Chamber of Commerce
will be guests of Wien Airlines
on Friday to Nome on the in
j augural flight of a C-46 cargo
plane converted into a passenger
carrier.
The group is headed by Sig
Wien and will stop two hours for
lunch at Kotzebue enroute here.
| The group will be met at the
i field by members of the board
i of directors of the N.W.A. Cham
| ber of Commerce at about three
I o’clock and they will be enter
tained at a Smorgasbord supper
at the North Star dining room at
seven o’clock in the evening.
The main purpose of the trip
is to coordinate plans of both
groups for the completion of a
road to connect the metropolis of
the interior with northwestern
Alaska.
Road-minded citizens not mem
i bers of the Chamber are invited
I to the dinner which is open to
j the public and reservations are
I being taken at the North Star.
_
Fires Raging
Uncontrolled in
Interior Alaska
ANCHORAGE UP)—Uncontrolled
fires have swept over more than
| a million acres of brush, timber
j land and muskeg in interior Alas
I ka and are still spreading, terri
I torial officials said today,
j The largest blaze, which has
been raging more than a week, is
in the Holikachuk area 400 miles
northwest of here. Some 640,000
acres have been burned.
Other fires are in the McGrath
area, 200 miles northwest, and
around Lake Iliamna, 150 miles
southwest of here.
Among the firefighters battling
the 40,000-acre Lake Iliamna fire
are members of the WKFL, Inc.,
a religious sect which is estab
lishing a colony in the Fox River
valley of the Kenai Peninsula,
near Homer. The colony is about
100 miles east of the lake.
Denmark Has Renewed
Hope of Finding
Uranium in Greenland
COPENHAGEN UP)—Prof. Niels
Bohr, head of Denmark’s atomic
energy commission, returned yes
terday from Greenland with re
newed hopes of profitable devel
opment of uranium deposits
there.
Bohr said hopes have soared
because the uranium content of
minerals found at Narssaq this
summer is greater than at earlier
findings.
Alaska’s Ability to Recover From
Nuclear Attack Is Surprisingly
Good, Civil Defense Test Indicates
JUNEAU, liB—'Three Alaska
cities were targets of nuclear
bombs two weeks ago in a make
believe test of civil defense prep
arations.
How did Alaska respond to the
simulated horror that was indi
cated by the drill?
' "We showed a surprising ca
pability to recover from a stag
gering nuclear weapons blow,"
says Harold Pomeroy, Alaska
Civil Defense Director.
“Juneau was destroyed and An
chorage and Fairbanks badly
crippled,” the lanky civil defense
head comments. “But careful an
alysis of resources and simula
tion of emergency actions showed
we can do a good job of taking
care of ourselves.”
As a matter of fact. Pomeroy
contends, Alaskans probably
would fare better than any oth
er part of the country should a
nuclear attack ever bring havoc
to this continent.
“We have all sorts of ready
made communication facilities
available—fish and wildlife radio,
amateur i^dio operators every
where, military radio, Coast Guard
communications, and loads of
others.
“We have more private planes
available for emergency than you
can find most anywhere—and just
think of the number of boats and
fishing vessels ready for evacua
tion purposes and transportation
of supplies.”
During the three-day test, July
12-15, Pomeroy says, many of
j these facilities were put to use.
I The day of the simulated attack,
[ July 12, “held” came also from
an unexpected source.
A Canadian cruise ship was
nearing Juneau when the bomb
! fell and the skipper volunteered
to take a load of people from the
harbor, a simulated evacuation
site.
Pomeroy says he is not one to
I say “everybody turned out and
the whole thing went over with
out a hitch.”
"In the first place," he says,
"we have to realize that people
are going to become frightened
and confused, and some of them
just won't react like we would
hope they would . . . Some
things are bound to go wrong."
Some things did go wrong dur
ing the test, Pomeroy said.
“We had a communication bot
tleneck despite our efforts. Radio
amateurs did a splendid job but
signals were poor and prepara
tions were not ample to cope with
this. Action must be taken to bet
ter this as loss of contact can lead
to chaos.”
The Auke Bay American Le
gion Hall north of Juneau was
the emergency government cen
ter for key federal and territorial
officials.
“But we lost time trying to
reach officials not physically pres
ent during the test,” Pomeroy .
says. “This would be many times
more acute in a real emergency.
What about a private citizen
who runs for the hills with his
family? "He should be in pretty
good shape." says Pomeroy."
“In Alaska there are abundant
supplies of wildlife and fish—
enough to keep Alaskans going
for months, if necessary."
Pomeroy says the drill demon
strated there would be a critical
shortage of food for infants and
invalids, and also an urgent need
for medical supplies.
“But a general conclusion is
that preparations to meet the
emergencies of war are good—
but there is much more that
should and can be done.”
NO COMMENT
FRESNO, Calif., UP)—'The Cali
fornia Highway Patrol received
this report from Valeria Potter of
Puente, Calif.
She said her car struck a tem
porary road barricade in Fresno
—and enclosed a bill for $55.04
for repairs.
“I would appreciate a check by
return mail,” she added.
Capt. Ray Salmon said com
ment was unnecessary.
House Passes Defense
Bill $2.3 Billion Less Than;
Asked by Eisenhower
WASHINGTON, Oil—The House
passed by voice vote and sent to
the Senate today a compromise
! bill appropriating $33,759,850,000
to finance the Defense Depart
ment for the present fiscal year.
The amount is $2,368,150,000
less than President Eisenhower
originally recommended altho he
later scaled down his requests.
A compromise between differ
ent allotments voted previously
by the Senate and House, the to
tal is $197,125,000 more than the
House had approved but $774,
379,000 less than the Senate had
voted.
The bill gives the Army $7.3
billion, the Air Force $15.9 billion
and the Navy $9.9 billion. Inter
service activities and the Office
of the Defense Secretary share
the balance.
-IT CALLS FOR CHEERS!” BIG DOU BLE FEATI RE BILL ; Bullet for |
ttH^rru. TONIGHT & THURSDAY I U2*BETHASC0 I
.... AT THE NOMERAMA I*1