Statesman Journal from Salem, Oregon • Page 1

pollo Tragedy Stalls U.S. Man-to-Moon Project Indefinitely POUNDED 1651 SALEM Months Delay Likely After 3 Spacemen Die By RONALD THOMPSON MANNED SPACE CENTER, Houston, Tex. (AP) The catastrophe that killed three astronauts inside a flaming Apollo spaceship cast a giant shadow on the U.S. man-to-the-moon project, stalling the $23-billion program for perhaps several months. 86 PAGES The Oregon Statesman, Salem, Oregon, Sunday, January 29, 1967 PRICE 15c No.

308 Ifffeirts J.D. Jurors Weigh Fate of Former Senate Secretary Bobby Baker said Baker pocketed $80,000 of that. The government also charged Baker with conspiring with Clifford Jones, former lieutenant governor of Nevada, and Wayne lIllliEifellliSfll HP. Mrs. Churchill Picked As Mardi Gras Queen Waifc in Vain (SPACE CENTER, HOUSTON, Tex.) Sam, the ITdlli 111 Ydlll pet of the Gus Grissom family, sits in the walk in front of the Grissom home in Timber Cove near the Manned Spacecraft Center, waiting for his master who will never return.

(AP) Rites for 3 Astronauts Slated Today, Monday SPACE CENTER, HOUSTON, Tex. (AP) The three astronauts who were killed Friday in a Cape Kennedy, flash fire in their Apollo spacecraft will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery and West Point. The burials will follow memorial services Sunday and Monday at churches near Houston's Manned Spacecraft Center, the training base for astronauts. Space Center officials said Saturday the bodies of Air Force Lt. Col.

Virgil I. Grissom, if: )- Air Force Lt. Col. Edward H. 116th YEAR 6 SECTIONS 1 DR.

FLOYD THOMPSON Heads Apollo Probe River Crests Not in Sight; Rains Persist Streams in the mid-Willamette Valley continued to rise Saturday and their crests still are not in sight with more rain and warm temperatures forecast. 22 Feet at Salem The Willamette River at Salem was at 22 feet at 10 p.m. Saturday. Flood stage is 23 feet. It is expected to reach 24 feet by Monday morning, the Weather Bureau'! River Forecast Center at Portland said.

The Santiam was at 13.2 feet early Saturday and expected to be at 14.5 feet Sunday morning at Jefferson were the flood stage is 15 feet. Rainfall at Salem Saturday was .48 inches and while the streams in the area continued to climb, surface water in the area was on the decline and few flooded roads were reported. The Lower Pudding River was over the road, on the Old Salem Road in the Bethany area west of Silverton and the South River Road near Independence was covered with water and warning barricades were put up. Wind, Rain Expected McNary Field weathermen forecast rain this morning, showers tonight, more rain Monday and winds this morning of 15 to 30 miles an hour. High temperature today should be 52, low tonight 45 and high Monday near 48.

Salem had a high of 57 and low of 50 Saturday. -1 Simplified Economics: Recession when the guy next to you loses his job. Depression when you lose your job. Panic-when your wife loses her job. J) OREGON L.

Bromley, once a close friend of Baker, to defraud the government in its tax collecting function by having checks made out to Bromley, with the proceeds going to Baker. By JERYME ENGLISH Statesman Women's Editor Mrs. Thomas W. Churchill, a diligent volunteer and leader in community, civic and church events, was saluted as the 1967 Mardi Gras Queen Saturday night. Announcement of her selection was the highpoint of Salem's brilliant social event of the season, the 10th annual Mardi Gras Ball staged by Salem General Hospital Auxiliary.

Five hundred attended the fund-raising event at Marion Motor Hotel and over $6,200 will be realized for the hospital, according to Mrs. Wayne Hadley, chairman. Joseph Glennie, president of the hospital board of control, revealed identity of the new queen. She was selected by an anonymous committee for her tireless work as a volunteer and outstanding contributions in the community. She is the wife of a Salem attorney and the mother of two.

Mrs. George B. Martin, 1966 queen, placed the jeweled crown on Queen Marian I. Other members of the royal court are Mrs. Stanley N.

Hammer, Miss Gret-chen Kreamer, Mrs. Stuart M. Lancefield and Mrs. John I. Sell.

(Additional details on page 25.) Beatniks Unwanted BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil (AP) Lisio Juscelino is against long haired beatniks in his restaurant. He has hired a doorman described as a "karate fighter" and ordered him to refuse entrance to "any guy who looks like a prophet." Start Your Day with The Statesman Page Sec. Ann Landers 33IV Classified Comics 1-8VI Crossword 32IV Don't Look Now 32IV Editorials 4 I Family Weekly l-28-V Garden News 47, 49, 50IV Obituaries 25111 Panorama 11-16 II Sports 2l-23lll Star Gazer 46.JV Sunday Special 31-36, Radio 33.IV TV 35,36, 45, 46.IV Valley News 17 II Top project officials would not predict how long the delay might be. They said only that the maiden manned voyage of the three-man spaceship had been postponed indefinitely. Air Force Lt.

Col. Virgil I. (Gus) Grissom, Lt. Cel. Edward A H.

White II and Navy Lt. Cmdr. Roger B. Chaffee were scheduled for a flight of up to two weeks starting Feb. 21.

But death came suddenly on a Cape Kennedy, launch pad Friday night when a flash fire swept through the cabin. No Plans Announced "I am not prepared to discuss our plans for the flight events to come," said Maj. Gen. Samuel Phillips, Apollo program director, at a Cape Kennedy news conference. No doubt it will be several months before a spaceship can be readied for the Apollo 1 mission.

An investigating board must first complete its report, and spaceships must be redesigned, if necessary. Officials then must start over with weeks of vehicle tests and astronaut training. Uppermost in all minds Saturday was: How did it happen and how can such a grim accident be avoided? The National Aeronautics and Space Administration named a seven-man investigating board to probe the accident. Also, Sen. Clinton P.

Anderson, chairman of the Senate Space Committee, said a Senate inquiry would follow the NASA probe. The NASA probe will be headed by Dr. Floyd Thompson, director of NASA's Langley, Va Research Center. Phillips said the exact cause of the blaze had not been determined. However, he noted the spaceship was filled with pure oxygen as used on all American spaceflights which has flash fire potential when sparked.

Possible Redesign Should NASA decide to discard the fatal vehicle, described officially as "heavily damaged," it has other spaceships. However, any redesign would take weeks, even months, to work out and test. Also, NASA could choose to scrub the Apollo 1 mission completely and move directly onto Apollo 2, a more complex rendezvous flight. Planning before the accident called for tbree manned Apollo missions in earth orbit, followed by a fourth with the capability of landing men on the moon. It was known that NASA had been hopeing for a lunar landing sometime in 1968, more than a year ahead of the nation's goal of placing men on the moon by 1970.

But, officials said all along, any 1968 try depended on a "success schedule." The tragedy placed such an optimistic schedule in jeopardy. Picture on page 2. Additional details on page 25.) WASHINGTON (AP) A jury of six men and six women Saturday took to a small room off U.S. district Court Room 21 the case of Bobby Baker who built up a fortune while serving as a Senate employe. Its duty is to decide whether Baker, in his complex financial dealings, evaded income taxes, committed theft and conspired to defraud the government, as the government has charged.

"What the verdict will be is your sole exclusive duty and responsibility," Judge Oliver Gasch told the jurors, mostly Negro, before turning the case over to them at 11:47 a.m. The trial started Jan. 9. At 10 p.m. the jury retired for the night.

With Wife, Son Baker, 38, a slender, partially bald man in a black suit, sat in the courtroom with his lawyers. His wife and a teen-age son, one of their five children, sat among the spectators. Conviction on all the charges could mean for the one-time Senate page a maximum of 48 years in prison and $47,000 in fines. Estimates of how long the jury would deliberate were guesses only. It was a complicated case, everyone agreed.

Woven closely into it all was the name of the late Sen. Robert S. Kerr, who died Jan. 1, 1963 10 months before Baker resigned under fire in October 1963 as secretary of the Senate Democratic majority. Claims Donations Baker said he turned over to Kerr in 1962 $99,600 collected by California savings and loan firms executives for political campaigns.

The government Storm Eases; Toll Hits 68 By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS The snowstorm which dumped most of its load on the Midwest 23 inches at Chicago, 28 at Kalamazoo moved into northern New England and eastern Canada on Saturday showing reduced intensity. Chicago and other cities paralyzed by drifts of five to 15 feet succeeded in reopening their traffic arteries by dint of round-the-clock work by thousands of diggers, but most neighborhoods still were snowbound. Sixty-eight deaths were attributed to the record storm in five states 42 in Illinois, 17 in Michigan, in Wisconsin, 3 in Indiana and 1 in Ohio. New Petitions Due to Limit Property Levy PORTLAND (AP) Petitions will be prepared and put into circulation promptly to get the l1. per cent property tax limitation before the voters of Oregon.

The secretary of the Oregon Homeowners Association said Saturday this would be done because "it is quite apparent that nothing will be done by the legislators." Harold E. Cox, secretary of the association that would have had the measure on the November ballot had it not been for a technicality, said a meeting would be held in Portland the evening of Feb. 9 "to give the general public the reasons for our move in circulating the petitions now." He said the association "has patiently waited for some action by the House Taxation Comit-tee to place the per cent tax limitation to a vote of the people at a special election." But, he said, it was now clear this would not be done. The V.z per cent limitation would hold property taxes to that percentage of market value. Powell to Pay $33,000 for Libel Judgment BIMLNT, Bahamas (AP) Adam Clayton Powell said Saturday he would make a partial payment of the $164,000 court judgment he owes and warned congressmen determining his right to be seated to be prepared for a counterattack.

Meeting newsmen for the first time since the House refused to seat him until it looks at his qualifications, Powell said he would pay $33,000 next Tuesday to Esther James, 70, the Harlem widow who won a slander judgment against him. In New York, Mrs. James attorney, Raymond Rubin, said Powell's offer was "only a drop in the bucket." He said it would be applied as credit against the full sum, which he now sets at $170,000. Mrs. James sued Powell for calling her a "bag woman" or graft collector for the police.

Saturday Powell referred to her as "that delightful widow." Also at the conference were Powell's business manager, the lawyer handling the slander case and the head of a record company that has just brought out a record of Powell's sermons entitled, "Keep the Faith, Baby." It is the royalties from the record that will go toward paying Mrs. James, Powell said. He hadn't paid her before, he said, because he didn't have the money. christening a Cherriot with a bottle of champagne. Prizes were awarded to parade entrants and people who entered ride-the-bus slogans.

Honored, too, was Homer Harrison, 86, long-time Salem transportation driver who received a lifetime bus pass latst summer from City Council. Gerald Frank Salem area Chamber of Commerce president, was master of ceremonies. The new 35-passenger buses provided free rides all day. Route scheduling was juggled and increased to carry the crowds. (Additional details en page 17.) Tax the Churches? St.

Josephg Magazine, published by Mt. Angel Abbey, has an informative article in its February Issue entitled "Should Churches Be Taxed." It was uritten by William J. Whalen, author and teacher (Purdue University). The subhead of the article is a solid argument for taxing many now-exempt churches and other religious organizations. Taxation seems logical and just when churches own and operate competitive business enterprises." In the article Author Whalen relates some of the recent history of the topic.

There was the case raised by Mrs. Madalyn Murray O'Hair, "the shrill atheist from Baltimore," who attacked exemption of churches in Maryland from property taxes. The Supreme Court of Maryland refused to review her appeal from a lower court decision ejecting her suit to require churches to pay taxes." The court of appeals upheld tax exemptions and point out that this simply recognized the contribution of religious organizations to society." Whalen also cites the recommendation of Dr. Eugene Carson Blake, former Stated Clerk of the United Presbyterian Church, that churches begin to make and progressively increase a voluntary contribution (to a maximum of 10 per cent of the normal tax) to help pay for police, fire, sanitation and other city services. Opponents, notes Whalen, raise the point that the power to tax "is the power to destroy." He doesn't (Continued en editorial page, 4.) MRS.

T. W. CHURCHILL Mardi Gras Queen Jets Strike Cong Areas SAIGON, South Vietnam (AP) U.S. air operations picked up on both sides of the border, and B52 jets staged another fire raid on jungle holdings of the Viet Cong Saturday. Pilots claimed the lion's share of 217 of the enemy reported killed in South Vietnam.

Of American ground forces, Marines were the most heavily engaged. They tangled with Communists in three actions in the northern provinces and reported a count of 45 enemy dead. Stormy weather saved the upper reaches of North Vietnam from attack Friday, but American squadrons flew 85 missions the high of the week against highways, bridges, coastal vessels and staging areas in the southern section. The Weather Forecast: Rain today and Monday. High today 52, low tonight 45.

(Complete report on page White II and Navy Lt. Cmdr. Roger B. Chaffee will be flown by military escort sometime Monday from Patrick Air Force Base, to Washington, D.C. and West Point.

Memorial services for Chaffee will be held at 5 p.m. CST Sun- The Oregon Stat flag at the Capitol will be flown at half staff until after the funerals of three astronauts killed Friday at Cape Kennedy, by order of Oregon Gov. Tom McCall. day at the Webster Presbyterian Church. Burial will be at Arlington Cemetery.

Two memorial services will be held Monday at the Seabrook Methodist Church, at 9 a.m. for Grissom and at 11 a.m. for White. Grissom will be buried at 9 a.m. Tuesday at Arlington.

White's burial will be at 11 a.m. Tuesday at the West Point Cemetery at Highland Falls, N.Y. Pallbearers will be astronauts. Astronauts All Insured MANNED SPACE CENTER, Houston, Tex. (AP) Each of the widows of the three Apollo astronauts killed in the flash fire at Cape Kennedy will receive $100,000 from life insurance policies.

The free policies are part of a contract under which two publishing firms hold exclusive rights to stories and photographs of the personal lives of astronauts and their families. The widows also will continue to receive, for the life of the contract, the lucrative annual payments specified in the document signed in 1963 by Field Enterprises and Time, Inc. The contract now provides $16,250 a year for each astronaut but the figure is expected to drop soon to $9,811 when 19 new astronauts who began training last year start receiving the benefits. Final negotiations now are under way with the 19 new space trainees. With their addition, the annual payments will be made to 47 astronauts and six widows.

Three other astronauts were killed in plane crashes. Millions for Migrants Millions of dollars are being spent in the Willamette and Tualatin valleys by the Valley Migrant League to bring a new way of life to migrants and seasonal farm workers. The first of a three-part series on aims and accomplishments of the VML starts today on page 5. RFK Says Secret Iks Seek Peace Cherriots' Begin Service in Salem iu'Jm OXFORD, England (AP) The next three or four weeks will be critical in the search for peace in Vietnam, Sen. Robert F.

Kennedy told 1,200 Oxford University students Saturday. The New York Democrat said secret talks are now going on and insisted that they must be carried out that way and not in the glare of publicity. The senator, answering questions from students at the packed Oxford Union Debating Society, gave no further information about the secret talks nor did he say where they were being held. In Washington, a State Department spokesman declined comment on Kennedy's remarks. Other government sources said they did not know exactly what Kennedy was referring to.

A State Department official said Thursday there had been indirect contacts with the Viet Cong recently, but said the talks were confined to discussion of the welfare of American prisoners in South Vietnam. Aleutians Jolted FAIRBANKS, Alaska (AP) A large earthquake shook an unpopulated area in the Aleutian Islands early Saturday, but there was nothing there to damage. The Coast and Geodetic Survey at College, site of the University of Alaska near Fairbanks, recorded the quake at 3:57 a.m. It was located 1,960 miles southwest of Fairbanks and registered between 6.25 and 6.75 on the Richter scale. The disastrous San Francisco quake of 1906 registered 8.25 and the Alaska quake of 1964 registered 8.1 A I rmm MHtatti II By ELLIDA MAKI Staff Writer, The Statesman The rain seemed to start on cue, just as the parade marched past City Hall, but the downpour Saturday morning didn't dampen a spirited inauguration of Salem's 17 new city buses.

Most onlookers. esDecially the children, didn't bother to seek sneiter ana watcnea wniie Danas floats, bicycles, fire engines, old city buses, and, of course, gleaming white new "Cherriots" roll by. At City Hall at noon, Salem and county officials held brief inaugural services, with the mayor's wife, Mrs. Vera Miller, In Rue Pararlo Salem's "Cavalcade of Transpor-m DUb raraut taton pr0gress" parade rolled down rainy downtown streets Saturday and included nearly every mode of transportation from the. boat above to wagons, antique cars, unicycles, carts and the stars of the celebration, Salem's new "Cher-riot" buses.

Officially launched at noon, tha buses carried crowds free of charge all day. (Statesman Photo.).