The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 23

vSyOiSrinlG Opinion Weather Deaths 'V Jan Iranrloro xamtnfr A section of the San Francisco Sunday Examiner Chronicle Sunday, August 12, 1984 section Charmer Domingo leaves adoring fans swooning in aisles S.F., two other cities at war over battleship ID mmmmmmf v. rff mmr I '3 i a big one right on Smith's cheek. How else do you respond to a woman who asks you to write, in Spanish, "I want you, "I am madly in love with him," said Smith, as she and her cloud floated away from Domingo's signing table. "1 can't believe it. I'm sorry.

I can't talk very well just now," said 18-year-old Erin Dineen, a student at Santa Rosa Junior College, who wiped tears from her eyes and sat down, shaking, after seeing Domingo. Last autumn Dineen had waited in line at a San Francisco department store where Domingo was signing books. She kissed him and a newspaper reporter wrote a story about it. Yesterday she offered a clipping of the story to Domingo, saying: "Remember when this happened? That was me." Domingo looked long at her, smiled worth and kissed her hand. On the record album she had purchased, he wrote: "To Erin, with lots of love, Plaeido Domingo." Some of the thousands stood quietly, watching their hero scrawl good wishes with a felt-tip pen.

But most of See Page B4, col. 1 Plaeido Domingo was signing books, records and Just about anything his fans handed him yesterday during an afternoon of autographing at a San Francisco record store .,1 By Stephanie Salter Examiner staff writer Like a seasoned Vegas lounge performer, Plaeido Domingo surveyed the audience, mopped his brow, then removed his suit coat and blue silk tie. But instead of segueing into "My Way." the great Spanish tenor hunkered down for a marathon afternoon of autograph signing. For nearly three hours, he chatted, smiled, kissed, patted and wrote his name for more than 2,000 fanS who crammed into the Record Factory on Geary Boulevard yesterday. And most of those adoring folks were not content with one autographed album or autobiography by the opera star.

They pressed four and five records upon him, programs from his Friday night concert with soprano Pilar Lorengar, copies of his life story, glossy photos of him as "Otello," even a 1982 Newsweek magazine cover of him. "I know this Ls presumptuous of me but could you please write, Te quiero, Nancy'?" said Nancy Smith, a San Francisco voice student, whose affec-t ion for Domingo beat out her sense of propriety. "And you are Nancy?" said Domingo, looking up through long dark lashes and allowing a mischievous smile to light his face. Smith said, yes, she was Nancy, and that her friend would take a picture of her if Domingo would kiss her hand. They don't call him a romantic tenor for nothing.

Domingo rose from his chair, bent over the table and planted ottiog S.F. statues are monuments to ExaminerFran Ortiz through some statues. Experts say the bronze rot has accelerated in recent years, threatening the estimated 60 city-owned bronze statues, plaques and busts, including about 30 in Golden Gate Park. "Bronzes are worth enormous, amounts," says Michael Bell, the Art Commission's assistant director. "A tiny bronze from the turn of the century can bring $25,000." Their worth as art, historical relics and tourist sights is incalculable.

Some of the bronzes cost tens of thousands of dollars when erected at the turn of the century. To replace them, casting work alone likely would run millions of dollars. The Golden Gate Park monument to Francis Scott Key, composer of the Star-Spangled Banner, was created by William Wetmore Story and financed with a $60,000 bequest of the wealthy 19th century real estate investor and philanthropist James Lick. One of the many statues financed by "popular subscription" is the Dewey Monument in Union Square, which By Howard Taylor Jr. Examiner staff writer 1 The news sent Long Beach's mayor and its Chamber of Commerce into a tizzy.

It sent business and civic leaders in Honolulu scurrying into strategy sessions and set the hot lines to San Francisco's congressional delegation abuzz. The fight for "Mighty Mo" had begun. And now, a month later, it's just getting hot. "Dianne Feinstein was quoted in Navy Times last week as saying sailors could go in any bar in San Franclscd: and have trouble paying for their drinks," said Honolulu businessman Roy Yee. "That's tough competition.

"But we've got some pretty sharp people here. We've pulled in business-. men, city people, congressmen. We've? been expecting this, working on hj for six months, and we intend to put up a good fight and win." Setting off this fight was Secretary of the Navy John Lehman's announce! ment that one of the three cities coukf become home port to the soon-to-bc reactivated battleship USS Missouri "Mighty Mo," a 40-year-old, 888-foot Iowa class battleship, is undergoing a 21-month, nearly $500 million overhaul and modernization at Long Beach Naval Shipyard The work is scheduled for completion in January. When ready, the ship will carry' equipment to accommodate helicopters, eight armored launchers capable of carrying 32 Tomahawk cruise missiles, four launchers capable of holding 16 Harpoon cruise missiles, four Phalanx rapid-fire weapons systems similar to Gatling guns, air and surface search radar and modern com- munications devices.

The Missouri will be accompanied by its surface action group: an escort cruiser, a destroyer and two guided missile destroyers. But San Francisco, I)ng Beach and Honolulu are competing for more than warships. The battleship brings with it 5,000 to 7,000 officers and enlisted men and at least 2,000 Navy wives, husbands and children. And their arrival will pump about $127 million annually into the home port's economy, creating 300 to 500 non-military jobs and a stable ship repair industry a long-term economic shot in the arm. "Of course, what it would bring to The City is additional work, jobs, the Sec Page B3, the faith Collins parently aiting for a bus.

-Nearby was a man with a black dog. As far as the public has known until now, that was the last confirmed sighting of the St. Agnes fourth-grader whose disappearance has turned into a national mystery; But this week, police revealed that another witness saw Kevin waiting at that bus stop the night he disappeared. When investigators received the first report of the man with the black dog, they withheld for two days the information about a dog being at the scene. They believed it would be a way of checking the reliability of subsequent reports.

It was during that time that a man who had seen a newspaper story about Kevin, including his notified police that he, too, had been on that corner and had seen the boy. The second witness said he felt See next page, col. 1 Inside Complete reports on local and national weather. L.A. deserves cheers for being a warm-hearted host to the Olympics.

Editorial. Fashion is funny, and it even affects words. Dick Nolan. There is simply too much advertising on television. Sydney Harris.

Li i it J. -J i 7. 4: if. Iff commemorates the victory of Adm. George Dewey at Manila Bay in 1898.

President William McKinley broke the ground, and President Theodore Roosevelt dedicated it Perhaps the most decayed, says Baird, is the Tilden monument to Spanish American War volunteers at Dolores and Market streets. Bronze rot now appears on this statue that weathered the great earthquake and fire. Another statue needing work is the Pioneers Monument, down the block from the San Francisco Art Commission's headquarters on Hyde Street This Frank Happersberger work was financed with $100,000 from James Lick, whose name on the monument is missing its bronze Sights like these stir the ire of preservationists and art professionals. "Why keep on producing things and buying things if you cant take care of them?" asks Judith Rieniets, former president of the 120-member conservation guild. The statues seem so indestructible" says Phoebe Dent Weil of the she said.

The officer was treated at a local community hospital for second- and third-degree burns on the left side of his face and for scalds on his chest Fry sa'd he's "now resting comfortably at home." Appointment sets stage for robbery A POTENTIALLY lucrative sale turned into robbery-by-appointment yesterday when a well-dressed man pulled a gun and held up a downtown jewelry store. When police arrived, they found an empty black pouch in front of an open safe, jewelry scattered on the floor and two visibly shaken men. Police say the bandit, a man in his By Tim Reiterman Examiner staff writer San Francisco's most visible art treasures are afflicted with two destructive diseases malignant corrosion and municipal neglect. From Golden Gate Park to Union Square, The City's magnificent bronze monuments to great people and historic struggles "are in desperate shape," according to Genevieve Baird, a bronze expert and president of the Bay Area Art Coaservation Guild. "We are talking about malignant corrosion," she says.

"It has probably been going on for many years and for the last 10 years has been rampant" Already, she says, some statues here have been severely damaged by triple curse of salty air, acidic soot and vehicle pollution that produces sulfuric acid when combined with moisture. These forces can reduce the work of artists such as Douglas Tilden and, Robert Ingersoll Aitken to green grit and black flakes of dead bronze. Corrosion has actually eaten holes At the tone, the time will be 20 cents The telephone company thinks you should pay to get the time of day. If a plan by Pacific Bell is approved, free tune calls would go the way of free maps at gas stations and free bottle openers at grocery stores. Charles McAvoy, Pacific Bell's general manager for the Bay Area, said it costs the company about $9 million to answer the 470 million calls it gets each year for the correct time.

Under the proposal submitted to the state Public Utilities Commission, there would be a 20-cent charge whenever someone dials P-O-P-C-O-R-N to hear a recorded voice give the time. This is one rate increase that will not be fought by a San Francisco group called TURN (Toward Utility Rate Normalization), said executive director Sylvia Siegel. The service is a "frivolous" convenience, Siegel said. "What we have to protect are the basic phone rates." Pacific Bell plans to hire a contractor to provide the time, although it would handle transmission and bills. I neglect sion president from 1975 to 1982.

"We never got a dime." However, he said, Mayor Feinstein this year did give the commission $30,000 to inventory and inspect all The City's art, including the statues. Feinstein is vacationing in Europe and was unavailable for comment. Deputy Mayor Hadley Roff said available records indicated the commission had not requested statue maintenance or repair funds either this year or last year. "This is the first I've heard of the problem," he added. More than two years ago, a commission official wrote experts at the Smithsonian Institution and elsewhere around the country, soliciting advice about the problem.

"San Francisco has what I am sure has become a common complaint among the world's cities: Our monuments are in a progressively deteriorating state," the official said. "All are in critical need of attention. Aside from needing cleaning, See Page B5, col. 1 Keeping for Kevin By Jim Wood Examiner staff writer The day he disappeared, sue months ago last Friday, Kevin Collins made a Valentine for his mother and father. A school exercise, it is the last communication his parents have from him.

On its left side is the beginning of an elaborately crayoned border. Dear Mom and Dad, I hope you don't have to spend a lot of money. I hope you have a good Valentine's day. Love, Kevin Below the message, inside a crudely drawn heart, is another note: "I love you." That night, Feb. 10, an off-duty Muni driver set off on foot for the Booker T.

Washington Community Center to play basketball. On the way, he passed a youngster he knew, Kevin Collins, standing on the corner of Oak Street and Masonic Avenue, ap victims was injured. False-report charge filed against woman OAKLAND POLICE Issued an all-points bulletin for a yellow Ford Escort yesterday after a panicky woman said she had been pushed out of the car by a man who drove off with her twin 2-year-olds in the back seat. But the bulletin was canceled when police discovered the children had been left at their aunt's house and the woman's ex-husband had the car. The woman, who was not identified, was booked for filing a false police report and held after police discovered outstanding warrants against (her for failing to appear in court on other matters.

Washington University sculpture conservation lab in St. Louis. "But within 10 years, in a major city, some irreversible damage will have occurred. "San Francisco is slow, if they are just discovering it now. Other cities have been (restoring statues) for the past decade." Since 1972, the Washington University lab alone has restored outdoor bronzes in New York, Chicago, St.

Louis, Philadelphia and Richmond, Va. The problem has not entirely escaped the Art Commission, the agency responsible for preserving the bronze statues and busts as well as 3,000 other municipal art works. Commissioner Ray Taliaferro said that funds for outdoor statue maintenance have been requested routinely but never granted by the mayor's budget office. "1 have been on the commission almost 15 years, and none of the mayors (Joseph) Alioto, (George) Mosco-ne and Dianne 07einstein) have allowed it" said Taliaferro, the commis ExaminerNicole Benaiveno with Kevin's disappearance early 50s wearing a suit and tie, walked into Miyara Jewelers after making an appointment by phone to look at some jewelry. Among the items was a ring reportedly appraised at $45,000.

After the robber entered the store at 10:30 a.m., and jeweler Marvin Hornstein had brought out jewelry from the safe, he pulled a small handgun from his pocket He also took a weapon from the holster of security guard Dean Gotham, 55, although he needn't have bothered the revolver was a fake. After locking Hornstein', 57, and Gotham in a lavatory, the robber grabbed $3,600 in cash from the safe and rifled several trays of rings and chains before fleeing. The full loss has not been determined, police said. Neither of the f- i i1- i mr i. ft, oN 1 2.

-i riWiiTninrrmiiiiMimiwiiiiii Minn -ri- Collinses work on plight of missing kids as one means of coping Bay Area report Man robbed, stabbed to death in Tenderloin ABRAHAM HAMDAN, 29, was roblHKi and stabbed to death in the Tenderloin outside 450 Jones St. before dawn yesterday, police said. I lamdan, a citizen of Jordan, was a former busboy at Perry's bar on Union Street. He lived in the outer Sunset District and was currently unemployed, Inspector Michael Mu'llane said. I If and a cousin parked on Jones Street at 4 a.m., and Hamdan left the ear apparently to negotiate with a prostitute, Mullanesaid.

Hamdan never returned to the car. Several witnesses told police they saw three men chase Hamdan up Jones Street, then tub him several tunes in his chest. I lamdan's cousin, whom police would not identify, went looking for Hamdan and found him lying between two parked cars at 450 Jones St His wallet was gone. Mullane said police have suspects in the case, but would not comment further on the investigation. San Quentin officer is scalded by water A SAN QUENTIN prisoner threw scalding water on an officer making his morning rounds yesterday.

Nit kola Frye, sjwkeswoman at the prison, said the inmate was a convicted murderer from Los Angeles County who was serving a sentence of 25 years to life. Prison officials are investigating what sparked the incident,.