The Daily Mail from Hagerstown, Maryland • Page 3

Woman Views City From Behind Grocery Counter Betly Lou Wishard By SANDRA FLEISHMAN Betty Lou Wishard always liked Ihe grocery business. It all probably goes back she remembers, to when she was a child and grandmother stood her on a Pepsi carton in Her grocery store and tried to teach her how to work a cash register. Since then Miss Wishard, 3G, has learned a lot more about grocery stores and now lias a business of her own, Betty Lou's Delicatessan on West Side Avenue. She can look back to when she was nine and laugh about how little she understood. "I just couldn't figure out the part where you count back the customer's change," she says.

"I'd watch my grandmother count back change from a 40- cent purchase and I couldn't understand how the dime made 50 cents and then the rest of the change became a a I tell grandmother, 'but he gave you a dollar and you gave him a dollar Seven Horses Die In Fire When Truck 7ire Blows Tragedy overtook a truck full of horses Sunday night when a tire blew and the (nick burst into flames on Interstate 81 near Williamsport. Seven horses owned by Billie Lou Davis, of Salem, were burned up in the truck. Two other horses in a trailer attached to Ihe back of (he truck were saved by Miss Davis and three other people traveling with her. "We did the best we could" to save Hie horses, Miss 'Davis said later, "but the flames overlook us." The accident occurred around 6:30 p.m. just past the 1-81 bridge near Williamsport, Miss Davis, who was ririving the truck, said the front tire blew out and she lost control.

"The truck swerved," she said, "and the bolts on the back wheel broke." Then she said the back wheel blew off and the gas tank on a side of Hie truck hit the pavement and exploded. The seven, and eight-year-old horses were valued at $1,500 according to the Stale Police. They represent almost the entire stable belonging lo Mrs, Davis. "I've got a horse and a coll at home." she said, her voice catching. State police said $11,200 damage was also done to the truck and trailer.

Miss Davis said she was. on her way to participate in a wagon train ride in Pennsylvania when the accident occurred. The large horses, she said, were the type used to draw covered wagons. Miss Davis, Robert C. Graham and his wife Barbara and Ronnie L.

Patseo, all of Roanoke, managed to unlie (he two horses in the trailer before that too was consumed by flames, None of the three people were injured. "We tried to pull the horse trailer away from the big truck" Miss Davis said resignedly, "but there were only three of us. "We didn't have time think about what was happening," she added, "The whole thing happc'ned too fast." Williamsport firemen responded to the call at 6:37 p.m. Grimes said. Traffic was backed up for two miles on the highway after the accident.

The Roanokc travelers were taken to the, Williamsport fire hall after the flames had been contained. Miss Davis said she had called home for a pick-up truck. The horses remains were taken away by the Hide and Tallow Co. of GrecncasUe, police said. The Williamsport fire department also fought a seven hour-woods blaze Sunday off Bottom Hoad, Grimes said From 11 a.m.

to 6 p.m. Williamsport firemen and others from Fairplay and Halfway beat down Ihe flames on the Hoffman Iract with brooms and rakes. Grimes said Ihe 80 acres involved are inaccessible to water. Grimes said the cause of the fire is still undetermined. In some areas, he said, the woods were totally destroyed.

But he said most of the damage was lo underbrush, honeysuckle and pine trees. Potomac Towers Slated For Completion June 30 Hagerslown's newest elderly housing project, a Towers, is slated for completion by the end of June and occupancy in July, according to the Hagerstown Housing Authority's general manager. The 200-unit highrise is "practically i i several floors," Paul Eberharl said Sunday and "the outside is pretty well completed." Applications for the 13-story building already number 300 on the waiting list, Eberhart said, "this discourage other citizens from applying." "While we have 300 ap- plications, more a openings), a lot could have made other arrangements by the time we get back to them," Eberhart said. Eberharl said the authority won't be contacting prospective tenants until at least a month before the building can be occupied. "And we haven't decided who's moving in yet," he added.

Eligible tenants must be al least 62 years old and cannot earn more than 53,700 if living alone or more than $1,200 for two people, Eberhart said. The a must not a assets of more than $10,000. Child Steers Auto Into Glass Shop A four and a half-year-old child steered a car into the Glass Shop at 167 S. Potomac St. Saturday night destroying a glass window, i reported.

Roy Zcger, of 410 Franklin shifted the car into drive and steered it across the street and into the building. Police said (he car, belonging a Guessford, of 25 Elgin had been left with its motor running. fashion's all-important BLACKWHITE FABRICS A beautiful collection of the newest prints and solids. Marvelous values! All machine washable and dryable. So luxurious i a i they're so SHOWN: Simplicity Pattern yd.

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The grocery, business has been a part ot her life since she was graduated Hagerstown High in 1954. Her first fulltime job was with Martin's grocery store. Ten-and-a-half years later, Miss Wishard had worked in almost every department and also cashiered. "Then I decided I didn't really know what I wanted to do," she recalls. So she took an IBM course in Waynesboro and found a job in data processing, "I quit the first day," she recalls.

"I just didn't like it. I was used to being wilh the public and I couldn't sit still in an office all day." Wilh a lot of determination and only S250 in Ihe bank, Miss Wishard bought her first store "on time" on Manic Avenue in 1966. She changed locations lo Boulevard, for two years and then orjcned her business West Side Avenue in the West End in 1970. "I always wanted 'the store to be in the West End" because of the ties she'd had growing up there, she says. The seventh child in a a i of five boys and five girls, Miss Wishard says "she was brought up on Maryland Avenue.

"All my brothers and sislers were hard workers," she says. "My father was very determined and the first ihing we learned in life was to work. Believe me, we learned." Now she says she's interested in passing on the sense of responsibility and determination a taught her lo the teenagers who frequent the store. "I'm very strict with the kids and they get mad at me," she concedes. "But when I first came to neighborhood, the kids were pretty rough.

Now when I tell them to leave if they make loo much noise they go." Miss Wishard is very concerned for Ihe teenagers in Hagcrslown. "They've I nothing to do and when they ask me what they can don't have an answer for them." "I've always had a great dream, if I had the money, that I'd find some way to organize clubs for kids in different age groups. I'd let them. have their own government in Ihe clubs and they could have recreation rooms and dance halls and organize activities," she says. Miss Wishard says she feels city officials, once they arc elecled, their responsibilities to get back lo the voters for their opinions.

Working in the delicatessan, "seven days a week, 365 days a year," she says she's heard a lot of people ialk about a lot of issues. And she says, it's not "all the politician's fault if we don't get things done. It's up to Ih.e people to make sure their councilmen do things." With this kind of civic responsibility in mind, she ran for the Cily Council from Ward One in 1968. She lost, but she says with "I was the first woman in Hagorslown lo win a primary and I really never thought get a lar." "It's hard to get women lntoJ polities," sho say IT" think more and more should participate in ment." And, she says she's thinking about running agairi-v "some With her kill of dcterminalion, it may not; be too long. THE DAILY MAIL, Hagerstown, Md.

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