The Courier-Journal from Louisville, Kentucky • Page 2

rV from a vv .1 A 4 THE COURIER-JOURNAL, SATURDAY, AUGUST 4, 1984 Perkins, advocate for Appalachia, education, dies riF fit? 4A Sill1 rS A4J FX 1 1 vs i 'rVA 1 Continued from Page One when he was stricken aboard a Piedmont airlines jet Officials said he complained of shortness of breath during the flight and collapsed in a restroom on the plane shortly after it landed about 11:20 a.m. Paramedics who treated him at Lexington's Blue Grass Airport found no trace of a pulse. He was taken to St. Joseph's Hospital and Rep. Carl.

D. Perkins. D-7th District, chatted with Steven Beshear, left, at the Democratic National Convention last month In San Francisco. Perkins and Beshear, lieutenant governor of Kentucky, were delegates. Below, Perkins helped House Speaker Thomas P.

"Tip" O'Neill. on with his jacket as they were preparing to leave O'Neill's office In 1981. Staff Photo by Bill Luttor ing former President Lyndon B. Johnson's "war on poverty" and was an early advocate of what later became the Appalachian Regional Commission. He was also a pioneer in job-training programs.

When he was in his district Perkins usually traveled alone, by car, stopping to talk with people at stores and post offices. "Most of the older folks know me," he said in a 1975 interview. "I've been around so many times, I chat with them about ordinary matters. They're frank with me." Some critics suggested Perkins' interest in impounding Eastern Kentucky's rivers was purely political. But be insisted that he had seen firsthand the misery floods had caused.

Perkins guided a number of dams and flood-control projects to completion and was a tireless advocate of several controversial projects, including the Yatesville Dam under construction in Lawrence County. He also was an advocate of the Red River Dam in Powell County, which was shelved more than a decade ago. Perkins was considered invincible in the heavily Democratic district and showed no signs of slowing down. He was a candidate for his 19th term, winning the Democratic nomination without opposition. He told a reporter in June that he planned to be a candidate again in 1986.

During the most recent congressional recess, Perkins attended the Democratic National Convention in San Francisco last month as a delegate supporting former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, the party nominee. Only last week Perkins had won another legislative battle with the passage in the House of a bill to allow student religious groups to WOO UUUUlllbU UCQU Ol J. 111. Fayette County Coroner Chester Hager said Perkins suffered a massive heart attack.

Natcher said yesterday that Perkins had complained earlier in the week that he was not feeling well. Dr. Barry Parsley of Lexington said Perkins had been in Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington earlier in the week, suffering from chest pains that were attributed to a cold. Perkins had been hospitalized in 1972 after he collapsed from exhaustion in the midst of a legislative battle over an education bill. Perkins' son, state Rep.

Chris Perkins of Leburn, said at the hospital that his father had "spent his life working for East Kentucky." "He had a dream for the people of Eastern Kentucky the same opportunities and the ability to compete anywhere. "He spent his life trying to put that in reality. He succeeded admirably," Chris Perkins said. Sen. Wendell Ford said Perkins had "a giant hand in shaping the growth of our nation's schools and colleges." "Although he was something of a legend, both in Congress and in Kentucky, he never forgot his roots in the mountains.

And he cared deeply about people," Ford said. Carl Perkins' wife, the former Vema Johnson, like Perkins a Knott County native, was at their suburban Washington home yesterday and was to fly to Lexington last night, Chris Perkins said. Funeral arrangements are being s. 7 '--1 -kv K2U L'r. h.

w-m 'M1M. VMa. Staff Photo by Kathy orcbon handled by the sergeant-at-arms of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Hindman Funeral Home. Funeral plans were incomplete last night.

Perkins was of the postwar generation of congressmen that included Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy. For a time, all three meet in public high schools. He was given the credit for guiding the legislation to passage.

Carl Dewey Perkins was born at Hindman on Oct. 15, 1912. And while be rose through the ranks of Kentucky Democratic politics to a position of power in Washington, he never strayed far from his Knott County roots. A 1975 Courier-Journal profile of Perkins described his farm home on the Left Fork of Troublesome Creek, where the congressman could be found virtually every s-'l? 'Vfv StaH Photo by Thomat Hardin served together on the Education and Labor Committee. Natcher said Kennedy, as a young congressman, would frequently leave his proxy with Perkins.

He would trust no one else with it, Natcher said. But unlike Nixon and Kennedy, who went on to serve in the Senate and, ultimately, to win the presidency, Perkins never looked beyond the House. Rep. Romano Mazzoli, D-3rd District, who served his first two terms as a junior member of Perkins' committee, said Perkins succeeded because he never sought to become a senator, governor or president "I think he was effective because he spoke as a member of Congress today, tomorrow and in the future," Mazzoli said. "He was willing to spend hours on the floor, talking with members, working up support for a bill.

He was willing to do all that undrama-tic footwork most members of Congress aren't willing to do." Perkins' legislative success was based on his ability to shoulder a prodigious workload as well as a shrewd mastery of the legislative process. A writer once described him as "a country lawyer who went to Washington and never changed a lick." Perkins, who stood well over 6 feet tall, walked with a kind of rambling gait that suggested his mountain roots. Some observers chuckled because he sometimes wore white socks with his dark business suits. But there was no laughing at his legislative record. Natcher said Perkins chose the Education and Labor Committee after his election in 1948 because those were two subjects that deeply affected his constituents.

Perkins succeeded to the chairmanship in 1967, after Rep. Adam Clayton Powell of New York was expelled from the House. Perkins, in turn, will be succeeded as chairman by Rep. Augustus Hawkins, D-Calif. Before becoming chairman of the full Education and Labor Com-mittee, Perkins was chairman of the general education subcommittee.

Natcher said he continued as chairman of the subcommittee. Perkins helped shape such programs as federal aid to libraries, vocational trainine. Head Start stu Above. Perkins, shown In 1967, was noted on Capitol Hill for his white socks. At right.

Perkins and Rep. Romano Mazzoli. D-3rd District, greeted wellwishers at the inauguration of Gov. Martha Layne Collins in Frankfort last year. it Si 1 .2..

toilTMiH VrttfffW Staff Photo by Katth William weekend: "The place has changed little in 36 years. With its white walls, linoleum floors and makeshift furniture, the farmhouse is unpretentious, deceptively plain. There are no signs of wealth or power about, few clues of the interest, or personalities, of the occupants. "An unknowing visitor might assume they were hill-country farmers. But the farmhouse belongs to U.S.

Rep. Carl Dewey Perkins, the most powerful Kentuckian in Congress, a man whose deceptive down-home style and tenacity have outflanked his more urbane colleagues for 27 years." Perkins was one of four children of what was, by mountain standards of the day, a prosperous Knott County family. His father, J. E. Perkins, was a lawyer and prominent political figure who served as school superintendent and county attorney.

His mother, Dora Calhoun Perkins, taught school. Perkins attended public schools in Knott County, as well as Alice Lloyd College at Pippa Passes and Lees College at Jackson. He earned his law degree at the University of Louisville School of Law and began his law practice in 1935. Like his father, he was drawn to politics, serving as commonwealth's attorney, in the state House of Representatives and as county attorney. It was during his service as county attorney that he met another county attorney, serving halfway across the state.

He was William Natcher, who would Join Perkins in Congress in 1953. Perkins' political career was interrupted by World War II, and he saw combat in France and Germany. After the war, he returned to Hindman and was elected county attorney again. When Earle Clements was elected governor, Perkins resigned to become counsel to the state Highway Department. Within a year, he had been elected to Congress with Clements' support.

Perkins was still fighting in Congress for his coal-rich district the-day before he died. His last official statement appeared in Thursday's Congressional Record, according to The Associated Press, and involved the debate over the synthetic fuels program. Perkins said he was as "certain today as I was 30 years ago that the answer to our short-term and long-range energy needs lies in the rich seams of coal that underly our land." He noted that he supported a $2 million pilot program for synfuels 30 years ago, but that it was shut down by the administration. "But time has proven me right about that." dent loans and adult education. Long an advocate of federal aid to education at all levels, Perkins found himself stymied in the early 1960s by interests that opposed such programs.

Natcher said he found the key to success when he shaped the program that became known as Title which made underprivileged children the focus of the legislation. "The credit should go to Carl Perkins," Natcher said of the many education programs enacted in the 1960s. Perkins also had a hand in Above, Rep. Carl Perkins posed in 1956 with his wife, Verna, and their son, Christopher, now a state representative. At left.

Perkins conferred with then-President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967 after Perkins became chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee. liao4battMfaba Asiociatad Pro.