Messenger-Inquirer from Owensboro, Kentucky • 12

1 2A MESSENGER INQUIRER, Owensboro, Nov. 1, 1978 Out of steam St. Louis' Union Station closed after 84 years graphed there holding the Chicago Tribune with its too-eager headline, "Dewey Defeats Truman," after his upset presidential victory. But Union Station's greatest moment probably came in December 1945. It was the first peacetime Christmas in four years, and hundreds of thousands of servicemen, discharged or on leave, jammed in with civilian passengers in a mad crush that was never repeated.

Rail traffic began its decline after the war. By 1958, only about 70 trains a day moved through Union Station. By 1961, much of the tracks where trains once waited to enter the enormous train shed had been torn up and replaced by parking lots. In 1970, the Terminal Hotel, added to the original building in the first year after it opened, shut its doors. The fatal blow, however, came a year later, when the federal government consolidated the remaining passenger trains into Amtrak.

Though Union Station is dead as a passenger train station, it may be reborn as a museum, or possibly a shopping complex. Chilean workers vote restricted election Associated Press ST. LOUIS In its heyday, more than 100,000 rail passengers and 400 trains passed through Union Station's gates each day. On Tuesday the 84-year-qld fixture reached the end of the line. A six-member jazz band played a medley of New Orleans-style funeral music as Amtrak No.

22 rolled out of the station to the sound of clicking cameras, and the landmark that had been a gateway to the Gateway City was dead. Union Station is closing because there aren't enough trains coming into St. Louis anymore to make the facility worthwhile. Only Amtrak runs passenger trains to St. Louis now six a day and Amtrak has set up a temporary facility nearby that it has deemed more practical.

"It's a shame," said Joe Borman, who has worked in the station's ticket office for 36 years. When the first train arrived at Union Station on Sept. 2, 1894, thousands were on hand to celebrate. On Tuesday, about 200 persons dotted the train shed platform and the side of the track beyond as the last train a St. Louis-to-Chicago run rumbled away.

Aboard the six-car train were about 50 railroad buffs who bought tickets to Alton, 111., then chartered a bus back to St. Louis. The passengers included many who vividly recalled the glory days of railroads. Mrs. Amelia Warren, 70, was aboard to take back a description of the journey to friends at a St.

Louis senior citizens group. "In the 1940s, Union Station was a social center as well as a station," she said. "Our family used to have Sunday dinner at the restaurant." There were many highlights during the life of the towering station, which once was one of the busiest and largest stations in the country. In 1948, Harry Truman was photo i V. I i fi 1 I Oin if Vh -i '-A 4.

X. -J f. i 4 fa i 1 Jl ECONOMY Continued from front page age has dropped below 800 in nearly six months. Analysts continued to blame the long slide on fears that the administration will be unable to cope with inflation. Interest rates continued to soar.

Chase Manhattan Bank announced it was raising its prime rate, the interest it charges its most favored borrowers, to 10H percent from 10V4 percent. Chemical Bank earlier announced it was raising its broker loan rate the same amount. AC HARRY HOUDINI Died 52 years ago Tuesday FINANCES We7 return Medium says Houdini next year to complete in Associated Press SANTIAGO, Chile Thousands of Chilean workers voted for local union leaders Tuesday for the first time since the armed forces seized power five years ago and abolished most labor rights. But President Augusto Pinochet's military junta banned current local leaders from seeking election, forbade campaigning and said it would replace any persons elected who had been members of political parties during the past 10 years. A decree issued Friday also continued the prohibition against union meetings, collective bargaining and strikes.

Labor observers said the elections apparently were an effort to appease the U.S. AFL-CIO. It threatened an economic boycott of Chile unless Gen. Pinochet, who also is commander of the army, took major steps by the end of November toward restoring union freedom. Labor Ministry officials said the elec The Treasury Department said interest rates on its 3-year notes hit a record high Tuesday of 9.36 percent.

That is the rate the government will pay to borrow money. The director of the Council on Wage and Price Stability said in New York that a recession is "absolutely inevitable" unless the administration can demonstrate within the next six months to a year that it can bring inflation under control. ple, spent more than $6,200 on dinners during the first three months of his tenure as a congressman. During the two-year period he also spent $17,170 for a motor home, $724 for a film of a bill-signing ceremony and $250 to have the Country Gentlemen, a Bluegrass band, perform at one of his functions. Another $40,000 went to repay loans he had incurred to finance his campaign.

Collins appeared, in the latest FEC records, to be in the best financial shape to face future opponents. He had spent only $77,808, leaving him with a balance of $139,548. Evans, in contrast, spent all but $4,861 of his $183,035, according to the latest records. Another congressman who appears well-bankrolled for future contests is Rep. Wes Watkins, D-Okla.

He raised $93,415 and spent $21,482. Tense tions covered 2,400 locals representing nearly half Chile's one million organized workers. Other sources estimated the number eligible to vote at closer to 250,000 because of exclusion of unions representing farm workers, maritime trades, small businesses and public employees, including workers at the government copper mines. Friday's decree also gave the govern-, ment the power to remove about a dozen national union leaders who oppose the regime's economic policies and have allied themselves with the AFL-CIO in trying to force changes. While most of their posts were not at stake in the local elections, the decree said all current leaders must swear within 30 days they have not participated in politics while in their union posts and will not in the future.

This would eliminate many of the union leaders because of previous political associations. Barry Bosworth, the director, said the administration must ignore unemployment for now and turn its attention to cutting spending. If it fails to do so, Bosworth said, the country will face the worst recession of the post-war era. Farm prices in October were up 23 percent over a year ago, the Agriculture Department said in a monthly report; Prices farmers get for the raw products they produce rose 1 percent in October, the second consecutive monthly increase. The department says retail food prices are going up an average of about 10 percent this year.

They are likely to rise at least 6 percent in 1979, the department said, and could go up as much as 11 percent if farmers get bad weather next year. In a bit of good news, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development reported in Paris that U.S. energy imports fell 12.5 percent in the first eight months of 1978 compared with the same period in 1977. That is good news because the gluttonous U.S. appetite for foreign energy contributes heavily to a negative trade balance and weakens the dollar abroad.

President Carter appointed Douglas Costle, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, to direct a new council responsible for keeping track of the economic impact of government regulations. The General Accounting Office reported that the federal government has done a poor job in collecting some $15 billion owed to it by the public. The government charges such a low interest rate on delinquent accounts that it often is profitable for debtors to take government money and invest it elsewhere rather than paying it back, the GAO said. s-V .1 4 Si i 4 moments Continued from front page In contrast, Kentucky Rep. William H.

Natcher, D-2nd, raised from his own pocket and spent a grand total of $20. The vast majority of those funds $13.20 went to pay for two newspaper ads. Rep. Charles Bennett, was almost as parsimonious. He raised also from his own pocket and spent $2,890.

Of that, $2,875 went to pay his election filing fee to the state. The remaining $15 went for postage. Bennett has been in Congress 30 years while Natcher has been a member of the House for 25 years. Most of the 30 congressmen raised less than $100,000 and spent slightly more than half that amount. Kentucky Rep.

Carroll Hubbard, D-lst, raised $95,984 during the two-year period, records show, and spent $53,511. The expense forms show the life of a congressman is varied. Evans, for exam Associatad Prsss DETROIT Devotees of Harry Houdini say the long departed escape artist promised during a Halloween seance in the hospital where he died that he'll be back next year with even more amazing feats. Four researchers into the occult began their seance in Room 401 of Detroit's Grace Hospital at 1:26 p.m. Tuesday 52 years to the minute after the magician died of a ruptured appendix in 1926.

Seated around an old wooden desk in the semi-darkness of the hospital room as others have done on previous Halloweens, the four beckoned him, and Houdini ap- "1 4 -4 -I peared, assures medium Irene Rucinsky. Houdini said he had not communicated with anyone on Earth since his death, and that he would not again before "taking over another body" next year. "I would like to be born on the anniversary of my death (next year)," Ms. Rucinsky quoted Houdini as saying. "The after-life is peaceful, quiet, and there are no differences between one another," but Houdini's life "terminated too quickly.

He had not fulfilled everything," Ms. Rucinsky said, so he wants to come back. "We're not just a bunch of kids with a pumpkin," stressed seancer Mark Mc-Pherson. "This is very scientific and very research-oriented." Before his death, Houdini had made several pacts with his wife and friends agreeing on a secret signal that the first to die would give others to make his ghostly presence known. Dozens tried for the $10,000 reward offered by Houdini's wife, Beatrice, to anyone who could prove contact with her departed husband's spirit by reciting the agreed-upon code.

In 1928, one medium did recite the code, but was later denounced as a fraud. I I win oe DOCK his work Because the code was then disclosed, no attempts have been made to try to use it. But each year since, groups have gathered on Halloween to make more attempts at contact. But this was the last chance to do so in the very room where Houdini real name Eric Weiss passed away. The aging Grace Hospital is scheduled to be torn down in the next year.

Sol Lewis, head of the Michigan Metaphysical Society, a 30-year veteran of parapsychology and a college teacher, led the group's questioning of the great Houdini. Would he come back as a magician? he asked. "Much more so," the medium said. Ms. Rucinsky said Houdini told her more work remains to be done on "the greatest illusion man has ever seen," a four-mirror disappearing act in which three persons vanish.

She quoted Houdini as saying persons in the after-life have the gift of prophecy, and said he predicted Middle East negotiations will break down, "relationships be totally severed and a direct confrontation will occur within a week." of public Intorsst occurring In this rogion. ftomt oro vjheatt's happeranng Is a caUndar of svsnts soloctod by tho sdilors on tho basis of widospraad appeal and significance. This column Is not In-tondod to supplant tho mors dotailsd listing that appears In tho dally ppl wmd column. Horns listod In tho wkorft hssafwislii column will includs major concerts, ntortainmont, special activities, significant sporting events and the like. today Kentucky Council of Area Development Districts fall conference begins at the Executive Inn Rivermont; noon, registration, 5:30 p.m.

reception. thursday Kentucky Council of Area Development Districts fall conference continues at the Executive Inn Rivermont; 9 a.m. opening general session; noon lunch and address by Paul Duke; 2 p.m. general session; 4:30 p.m. election of officers; 6:30 p.m.

reception. Conference continues Friday. Senator Wendell Ford will be guest speaker at the 7:30 a.m. Rooster Booster Breakfast to be at Gabe's restaurant. police officer; an unidentified Catholic priest; Paul Stravavy of the Hammond police; Cuevas, and another unidentified priest talk to Cuevas.

The police, clergy and a girlfriend finally convinced the Cuevas, a factory worker, to surrender. A spokesman said Cuevas was despondent over several unspecified things. Officers and clergymen in Hammond, Ind. spent part of Monday afternoon trying to talk Michael Cuevas out of shooting himself. The 19-year-old Cuevas walked onto the Bishop Noll High School football field, put a gun to his temple and threatened to kill himself, authorities said.

From left, Ernest Malatinka, off duty.