Asbury Park Press from Asbury Park, New Jersey • Page 3

Aabury Park Press, Sun. Oct. 2, 1977 Ali 77 Update Looks Like a Career 'A 4 It all began about three years ago when Peggy Matthews of Haztet Township got her hair cut short and people began mistaking her for singer-actress Liza Min-nelli. At first she only got whispers from people in stores and restaurants. Now she gets paid by some restaurants to entertain customers.

In tact she has launched a PRICES YOU CAN AFFORD DIVORCE: UNCONTESTED, NO SUPPORT $200 PROPERTY OR CHILDREN INVOLVED SIMPLE WILL: All PROPERTY TO SPOUSE 535 AND OR CHILDREN. BANKRUPTCY: personal $225 UNCONTESTED INCORPORATION: simple corp. $150 ONE CLASS Of STOCK Do not indudo Court, KHng foot and Oisbvnomonlt OTHER LEGAL FEES ON REQUEST NO CHARGE FOR JNITIAl CONSULTATION. Ernest J. Gikas ATTORNEY AT LAW 39 MAIN FARMINGDALE, N.J.

938-3900 career as tne look-alike ot the well known entertainer. "I've been pretty busy. I just appeared with Bath Baal and Mihain-mad All on an NBC special, Come On Saturday," said the 28-year-old mother of one. Mrs. Matthews also has done several television commercials and is await ing the results of a screen test which she did for a part in an upcoming PUS Mlxvs0mm 1 movie.

PEGGY MATTHEWS "I hope I pass the screen test on my own talents. I have had no trouble getting jobs as a Liza look-alike. That's unusual since most applicants are put on a waiting list after interviews," she explained. Mrs. Matthew belongs to a club, Celebrity Looka-likes Unlimited, and the group Is planning a television special which will be aired sometime next year.

Another big moment is approaching for Mrs. Mat- thews, whose husband, Jack, is one of her biggest supporters. "I just received a letter from Liza's manager and he has arranged for me to meet her in New York in a couple of weeks," she said. Ju 1 aw WEDNESDAY NIGHT 5 TO 10 PM Adoption Policy Adopted Asbury Park Prat Miss Bertha Heath views destruction caused by developers of her former Middletown Township property. Daughter of Former Slave Loses Homestead for a Dollar Complimentary ShKiMr Served ol your table! OUR FAMOUS SALAD BAR (with dinner) FEATURES STEAMERS CLAWS (on a Vi shell) COLE SLAW POTATO SALAD MIXED SALAD with CHOICE OF DRESSINGS BLOCKS OF CHEESE PICKLED BEETS HOT PEPPERS MIXED BEAN SALAD COMPLETE BUSINESSMAN'S LUNCHEON Back in 1904 when New Jersey created the Board of Children's Guardians to place children for adoption there was little concern about the adoptees eventually seeking the identities of their natural parents.

But today, after nearly 9,000 children have found adoptive parents, the state Department of Human Services has established a new policy to help adoptees gain access to previously confidential records in order to trace their parentage. Human Resources Commissioner Ann Klein said a growing number of adopted children are trying to trace their parents since they have grown to adulthood and the new filing system is the best way to help them. Under the confidentiality rules of the department, only those persons, adoptees or natural parents, who make a request in writing to be included in the new file will be included. They are also responsible for updating the files with name and address changes over the years. I SPECIALS 10 Senior Citizen Discount for lunch Hours: Mm.

rkru Thurs. 5 to 10 Fridoy 5 to 12; p. Sat. 4 to 12; Sun. 1 to 10 528-6950 "A Get to know your fine fumed friends with Dr.

Fox's column Ask Your Vet. Dr. Fox answers questions on animal behavior, health problems, proper care and nutrition. It's something every pet owner should read. The-Ask Your Vet column is featured every Thursday and Sunday under "Pets" in the Asbury Park Press.

10-Year Appeal Ends garden state air conditioning While the Newark racial riot was at its height on July 16, 1967, disturbances also broke out in downtown Plainfield. During that outbreak, Patrolman John V. Gleason confronted an angry mob on a street and a wild brawl ensued. Minutes later the crowd fled, leaving Gleason dead on the street. Months after the disturbance, several persons were arrested and charged with the policeman's murder, but only two, Gall Madden and George Merritt, stood trial.

Miss Madden was convicted of the crime several years ago and is serving a life sentence at the state Correctional Institution for Women at Clinton. Last week, Merritt, 33, was convicted of the murder for the third time and lost a 10-year battle for his permanent freedom. Merritt was convicted twice before of beating the policeman to death with a meat cleaver or hammer, but both convictions were overturned by an appeals pourt on legal technicalities. In 1973, while Merritt was preparing the appeal of his first conviction, he appeared at a meeting of the People's Coalition for Peace and Justice in the Unitarian Church in the Lincroft section of Middletown Township. He was scheduled to speak to the group at the township library, but when members of the state Po-' licemen's Benevolent Association filled most of the seats, Merritt declined a confrontation.

Merritt is the first person in the state's history to be convicted of the same murder three times. After his latest conviction in Elizabeth, he was sentenced to a mandatory life sentence. until 1974, when she contemplated retiring from her job and moving to the township, where she owned land and a house. ACCORDING to court depositions, she offered to let the organization have her home as an ashram. She testified that Gupta told her the home site wasn't enough, that she'd have to turn over all the land to him.

Miss Heath testified that she agreed with the condition that the land never be used for anything else but an ashram. She said Gupta agreed to give back the land if the organization ever tried to use it for other pur-poses. She said a Swami Shivanada, or David Zup-nick, was present at at least one discussion concerning the transfer. Zupnick, former president of Yogi Gupta has disappeared. The land had belonged to her, and before that, to her father, Clinton Heath, one of the township's first black farmers.

Miss Heath testified that Gupta took her to a lawyer of his own chosing for the land transfer. A deed was executed conveying the land to Gupta for $1 on Nov. 14, 1974. It listed none of Miss Heath's stipulations. MISS HEATH said the conditions were understood between teacher and disciple.

The relationship is revered in Yoga, she explained. On Dec. 31, 1974, he transferred the land to the corporation. Soon after that, a New Jersey corporation was formed. Miss Heath said the land was supposed to be transferred to it so that the ashram could be established.

Gupta said Miss Heath donated the land to the corporation with no conditions. "She did it for the souls of her deceased parents," he testified. Swami Swamimadhavadamda (formerly David Taylor of Rumson), the present president of Gupta said Miss Heath deceived the yogi about the condition of the property The corporation had to pay the taxes for the year, amounting to $10,000, and clear the ruins of Miss Heath's house, which had burned down. TAYLOR SAID the corporation paid the taxes, placing itself in financial straits. Gupta, in 1975, decided to return to India.

"I told them I would like the American people now to conduct all the activities because it was too much for me," he said. Before leaving, there were discussions about selling the land "because we had no funds." Meanwhile, Miss Heath was waiting for the organization to transfer the land to the New Jersey corporation and start her ashram. On Oct. 29, 1975, the organization sold 10.2 acres of the land to Williamsburg Estates Inc. for $72,000.

The deed was signed by Zupnick to Charles Van Over, 42 Hillyer Circle, here, who planned to build cluster homes on the site. THE NEXT DAY, 10.75 acres was conveyed by Zupnick to Joseph Grossman of Millbrook lane, Colts Neck Township, for $125,000. Miss Heath said she first became aware that By JAMES MC TAGUE Press Staff Writer MIDDLETOWN TOWNSHIP The developer's saws spilled the trees like tenpins. Ten acres of elm, birch, mountain laurel, dogwood and holly had been taken in the wake of a lawsuit pitting a feisty, 69-year-old woman against an Indian yogi. Another 10 acres awaited destruction.

Miss Bertha Heath, 179 Harmony youngest daughter of a former slave, stood on a small rise, sadly viewed the devastation. The land once had belonged to her, and before that, to her father, Clinton Heath, one of the first black farmers in the township, who came in 1885. A practitioner of Yoga since the late 1920s, Miss Heath had hoped to find inner peace here in her retirement by establishing an ashram or retreat for other followers of the eastern dicipline. INSTEAD, after two years of legal battling she has lost the property, assessed at $140,000, to a Queens-based Yoga organization for $1. The organization has contracted to sell the land to two area developers for $197,000.

In addition, Miss Heath, whose loyalty to her birthplace caused her to reject $100,000 plus the site of her father's original homestead in settlement, now faces damages and liability for the Yoga organization's estimated $60,000 in legal fees. The slightly built woman told Superior Court Judge Thomas L. Yaccarrino last June that she'd rather lose everything than settle. Miss Heath claims she was flim-flammed by the yogi, Kailash Nath Gupta of India, into turning the land over to him. The yogi claims Miss Heath made a no-strings-attached gift of the land.

YOGI GUPTA had been Miss Heath's teacher since October 1954. "It took him 20 years to break down my defenses. you can't trust a man who lives the exemplary life, who can you trust?" she said as she made her way amomg the hundreds of wooden carcasses. Miss Heath had been living in New York City, working for the city Department of Hospitals, when she first encountered Yogi Gupta. was something of a thrill for her to meet him.

"I had been studying Yoga for 20 years under various teachers in this country. Then a friend of mine told me about Gupta. She told me, 'There is an honest-to-God, real yogi from India in We were very excited." Miss Heath took classes with the yogi at his ashram at 127 E. 56th St. two or three times a week.

AN AFRICAN Methodist Episcopalian, she studied the Hindu system of body control and meditation for health reasons only. "Yoga is a way of life. It takes away the urge to smoke and to drink. It doesn't confine itself to any one religion," said Miss Heath, who says she holds a masters degree in public health from Columbia University. Miss Heath or Savitre Devi, as she was known in Yoga circles, began thinking in 1961 or 1962 that she would like to manage her own ashram on land she owned in the township at Route 35 and Harmony road.

She occassionally discussed the idea with Gupta, but the discussions did not become serious Guptai Inc. decided to sell the land in August 1975, when one of the developers knocked on her door and asked if she had any more land for sale. She called Zupnick and had "heated words over the phone. "He informed me he was selling the land because of his conscience and his God and then in-fomed me of my profound stupidity," Miss Heath testified. Zupnick could not be found to confirm or deny this.

Taylor told the organization's lawyer, Francis McCarter of Rumson, that Zupnick had become somewhat disoriented in February 1976 and disappeared. Miss Heath next called Yogi Gupta in India. Gupta claimed Miss Heath told him, "I am under pressure from my relatives. They found out that I sold the property. They are mad at me.

And if I don't get the proceeds, they may put me in an institution." TAYLOR SAID the land had never been transferred to the N. J. corporation because the administrators of Gupta Inc. had been busy with day-today chores. "The people who run the organization are selfless servants or volunteer 'workers and they are asked as volunteers to fulfill positions which may be required.

The president may be asked to vacuum his own room and may be asked to vacuum an entire floor," he testified. Miss Heath hired William Blair of Monmouth Beach as her lawyer and filed a suit against Yogi Gupta and the corporation which bears his name on Nov. 3, 1975. Blair offered to settle the suit for $100,000 plus the homesite in 1976. The corporation found this agreement acceptable, and Blair and two other lawyers persuaded Miss Heath to take the money.

Once back home by herself, she began to reconsider. '1 COULD have sold the land years ago if I wanted to, but the land is special. My father, a former slave, showed people if you do things right, you can make it," she said. Her father, one of the first blacks in the township, raised 13 children on the land. The family withstood the Klu Klux Klan, verbal abuse, the burning of the then 79-year-old Clinton AME Church in 1966 and other indignities.

"Money is good and convenient. But it loses its identity. If you drop money on the ground, it becomes the property of whomever gets his hands on it. I don't want to sell. Just give me back the land," Miss Heath said.

She refused the settlement before the legal papers were drawn. Blair withdrew from the case and was replaced by Callis Brown of Teaneck. JUDGE YACCARINO dismissed Miss Heath's complaint against the Yogi Gupta and the corporation on Sept. 21, 1976. Brown appealed, but the appeal was dismissed on Aug.

4. McCarter said he will sue Miss Heath on behalf of his client "for all the damages I can prove." The suit has been a disaster for everyone involved, except Yogi Gupta, who, according to McCarter, has no financial interest in the corporation. Taylor said the legal fees have nearly put his organization out of existence. He claims no individual will gain from the sale of the land. He refuses to reveal how the money from the land sale will be spent.

The developers have faced costly delays. Miss Heath will lose her homestead. As the balck woman walked through the woods, looking at the felled trees, she resolved to save some of the holly trees. "I love holly. We used to sell it at Christmas.

I don't mind people walking in our woods, as long 1 as they don't uproot anything." Super I ELECTRONIC AIR CLEANER Installation Extra Slg VALUABLE COUPON 2 Eagle Observed For Eight Months LAKE FOREST, HI. (AP) The rain forest of Guyana is a strange place populated by animals such as the South American harpy eagle. And for eight months Neil Rettig was there studying the bird. Most of his time was spent up a tree. A Lake Forest naturalist and cameraman, he headed the first team to film the nesting cycle of the South American harpy eagle.

"It's probably the most dramatic eagle in the world," said Rettig, 27. "It's one of the largest eagles, although its wingspread is only five feet. That's because it has to maneuver in the jungle. It is much faster and more agile than an open-country eagle." The harpy can kill any monkey in South America and regularly slays small deer. And Rettig learned while climbing to his blind, 130 feet off the ground, that it will not hestitate to attack a man.

The eagles' nest was only a few floors up at 185 feet and they didn't welcome human Intruders. "When we climbed to the blind, we wore motorcycle helmets and heavy leather jackets," said Rettig. "By the time we were through, the leather jackets were in shreds." The attacks were a good sign, though, Rettig says. "If they attack you, it shows they won't move the nest once you start observing them," he said. "I was glad when they attacked us.

It was only when we were climbing the tree that they attacked us. Once we were in the blind, they were completely nonchalant." Two Military Contracts Issued FT. MONMOUTH Two sizable military contracts have been issued to small business firms in New Jersey by the ECOM Procurement and Production Directorate. One award, estimated at $434,000, was given the Erilynn Corporation, Washington Township, for custodial services here for fiscal year 1978, which starts Oct.l. The other contract, for $167,000, was awarded Jet-Tone Contractors, Allenhurst.

It covers the installation of resilient flooring to be. done in Wherry Housing military quarters. A iCI mm CEIITiAcOliD. ESI I mi I MODEL 38CE $75 INSTANT REBATE! Offer good on proposals dated Sept. 28-0ct.

28, 1977 garden state air conditioning You'll never find a better traveling companion than MASTER CHARGE CENTRAL JERSEY BANK Freehold -462-7800 Red Bank 747-5565 Bricktown 477-9400 AMoeiatao trett PLAYTIME A tiger hangs onto a beer keg floating in a lake at Great Adventure, Jackson Township. The nine-year-old animal wasn't really in need of a drink. He was Just enjoying a playful afternoon. CONVENIENT OFFICES 10 SFVE XJ MIDUIF.SE MONMOUTH OCEAN UNION MEUBEtf FDIC ernaCentrsrjey.