The Capital Times from Madison, Wisconsin • 2

Doug Moo The Talk Bobby Fischer, the FBI and us iiwwaH ASSOCIATED PRESS The FBI was never certain, but Sunday, drawing on the letters archived in Madison, the Inquirer made the case for Paul Nemenyi. On Bobbys 1943 birth certificate, Gerhardt Fischer is listed as the father, and Gerhardt and Regina didnt divorce until 1945. But they had separated years earlier and Regina came to the United States in 1939. Gerhardt never did. The FBI files say Regina and Nemenyi met in the United States in 1942.

Bobby was bom a year later. In one letter after Paul Nemenyis death in 1952, Peter wrote to a New York physician: I take it you know that Paul was Bobby Fischers father. The Historical Society also has a letter from Regina Fischer to Peter, after Pauls death, asking Peter to let me know if Paul left anything for Bobby. In the letter Regina mentioned Bobbys tom shoes. Four years later, the name Bobby Fischer was known around the world.

His half-brother Peter Nemenyis life as a foot soldier for social justice never made headlines. He just did quiet good works wherever he went. Nemenyis papers came to the Historical Society in 1975, but he was still at it until last summer, when he died, in modest circumstances and on his own terms, in North Carolina. The Raleigh paper had a sweet obit titled Requiem for a social conscience. It didnt mention Bobby Fischer.

Chess champion Bobby Fischer plays chess in this August 1971 file photo. seems unusual when anything important doesnt come here. Not only do we have the papers of Daisy Bates, mentor to the Little Rock Nine" heroes of desegregation, here too is the rock that went through Bates living room window when it was publicized she was helping the young black students. There is much more. The Bobby Fischer connection in Peter Ne-menyis papers has to do with Paul Nemenyi, Peters father.

Fischer, after all these years, continues to fascinate and repel. The December issue of the Atlantic Monthly has a opus titled Bobby Fischers Pathetic Endgame, which indicates Fischer has become a recluse given to occasional lunatic rants on a radio station in the Philippines. That behavior was hinted at in his most famous match, in Iceland in 1972, against Soviet champion Boris Spassky. After losing the first game Fischer blamed the lighting, the audience and the high polish of the chess board, eventually demanding that the second game be played in a ping-pong room off the main hall. At that, Spassky blew up, too, claiming Fischer was using an electronic device to spook him.

In the end Fischer won the match. It was spectacular theater, and even when he quit tournament chess Fischer remained famous for being famous, a condition proved irreversible by Ivana Trump and the cast of Hollywood Squares. Fischers notoriety meant the Philadelphia Inquirer was interested in Fischers mothers FBI file, which became available when Regina died in 1997. Reporters IN J. EDGAR Hoovers America even paranoids had enemies.

When Bobby Fischer, the young and troubled chess genius, went to Moscow for a match in 1958, Hoovers FBI had already been tracking his mother for 16 years. Regina Fischer spoke eight languages and heard voices in all of them, according to a psychiatrist who pronounced her paranoid in 1943. Reginas FBI file grew to 750 pages and it is that file, recently declassified, that eventually led two Philadelphia reporters to an archive in the Wisconsin Historical Society here, and the startling discovery, revealed in archived letters, that Bobby Fischers father was likely not German biophysicist Hans-Gerhardt Fischer, as had been widely believed. It is quite a tale, Harry Miller, the Historical Societys senior reference archivist, was saying Thursday. The documents archived in Madison are the papers of Peter Nemenyi, a civil rights activist who died in June at 75.

We need to keep reminding ourselves that much of the history of the civil rights movement is living and breathing at the campus end of State Street. In the early 1960s the Historical Society director, Les Fischel, began aggressively soliciting civil rights and social action materials, until now it Peter Nicholas and Clea Benson got it through a Freedom of Information Act request, and when they started reading about Regina Fischers Hungarian friend, Paul Nemenyi, they got in touch with Miller at the Wisconsin Historical Society. Hoovers FBI thought Nemenyi was a communist. He appeared on their radar after Bobby Fischer went to Moscow in 1958 at age 15. Fischer was the precocious U.S.

chess champion and FBI agents monitored the trip closely, since theyd been snooping on his mother since 1942. According to Sundays Philadelphia Inquirer: Agents made it their business to find out who Fischers father was. Heard something Moe should know Call 252-6446, write PO Box 8060, Madison, WI 53708, or e-mail dougmoemadison.com. 2A The Capital Times Friday, Nov. 22, 2002 E-mail: citydeskmadison com Assistant city editor: Chris Murphy 252-6420 City editor.

Ron McCrea 252-6419 Assistant city editor: Karyn Saemann 252-6484 Whole Foods firings stir flap By Aaron Nathans The Capital Times DAVID SANDELLTHE CAPITAL TIMES Mayoral proclamation Madison Mayor Sue Bauman signs a proclamation Thursday declaring November as Diabetes Awareness Month for the city. The disease afflicts some 16 million Americans. Watching Bauman are (from left) Branden Schultz and Eran, Aaron and Jacob Liebe. Two Whole Foods Market employees who led the charge to form a union there paid for a soy latte with their jobs this week. Union officials allege the women were singled out for scrutiny because they were on the committee that got the store organized this summer.

Both were fired Wednesday. A customer ordered a latte with skim milk on Tuesday, and Debbie Rasmussen said she made it with soy milk by accident. Instead of pouring it down die drain, she gave it to a female co-worker, she said. An hour later, they were called separately into the store team leaders office and were suspended for the day with pay, Rasmussen said. The next day, when they came into work, they were fired, she said.

It was something that happens all the time among Whole Foods workers, said Rasmussen, who was a juice and coffee bar supervisor but was not considered a manager. Thats how I was trained I wasnt doing anything wrong. Texas-based Whole Foods spokeswoman Kate Monteilh said she could not speak about specific employee issues. The reasons for termination had nothing to do with any third party that these individuals were affiliated with. It had to do with our rules and policies of our com- in Jefferson County Other cities curb idling Penalties include fines, jail time By Judith Davldoff and David Callender The Capital Times Although some city lawmakers and members of the news media are already deriding a local proposal to restrict the idling of motor vehicles as so Madisonian, there are actually similar regulations in places across the country.

According to the U.S. Department of Energys Web site, there are idling regulations on the local or state level in 15 states, including Minnesota, New Jersey, Connecticut, Missouri and Colorado. In St. Louis, for instance, idling is limited to no more than 10 consecutive minutes, except for emergency vehicles, according to the Web site. Fines for the violation can range from $1 to $500, imprisonment of up to 90 days, or both.

By comparison, the proposed fine in Madison would be a $25 ticket. Other communities that have implemented an idling ban include Phoenixs Maricopa County, which prohibits diesel-powered vehicles from idling for more than five minutes. The ban, in place since July, is in response to a newly passed state law that limits such practices. According to Maricopa Countys Web site, the annual amount of fuel consumed by idling trucks costs vehicle owners $3.75 billion a year. Denver has a long-standing policy banning any vehicle with a smoke-producing engine from idling for more than five seconds.

Madison City Council President Matt Sloan and Mayor Sue Bauman are floating a proposal to ban motorists in the city from idling their vehicles for more than five straight minutes per hour, intending to reduce residential noise and air pollution. Sloan said he has received complaints from residents in the south side Bay Creek neighborhood for three years about commercial trucks idling at nearby businesses. They pull the truck up in the morning at 5 a.m. and load up, so you have the noise and exhaust, Sloan said. Its particularly bad in the summer.

Sloan said his constituents usually call him in frustration after the truck has been idling for a couple of hours and ask, Cant we do anything? Bauman said she has heard complaints from the Greentree neighborhood on the citys southwest side about the environmental impact of idling vehicles. She proposed the ban as a way of exploring the matter. Bauman added that concerns about idling have also come up in the area around the Schoeps ice cream plant on the near-east side, where trucks idle for lengthy periods of time. It has also been an issue with buses on Fish Hatchery Road. See IDLING, Page 3A Gulls die Food source is suspected LAKE MILLS (AP) Preliminary tests suggest the deaths of hundreds of seagulls that washed ashore on at least four Jefferson County lakes were caused by something the birds ate.

Wildlife health specialist Carrie Be-heler said Thursday that necropsies of the dead birds at the Wisconsin Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory in Madison found their kidneys had stopped functioning, leading her to believe it was something the birds had consumed. But she held off on a final diagnosis pending additional tests. Herring and ring-billed seagulls on Rock Lake, Hope Lake, Lake Ripley and Mud Lake were found dead Wednesday by conservation wardens. Charles Kilian, a Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist, said he first heard about such deaths on Rock Lake late last week, when a resident reported three dead seagulls. But he said he found no evidence of dead birds until Wednesday.

ASSOCIATED PRESS Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist Charles Kilian collects a dead seagull Wednesday on the shores of Rock Lake. Whatever it was, it happened quickly, he said. It may be something they ate out on a landfill or in a farm field. With four lakes involved, he said, he believes the cause is something away from the water that the seagulls are eating. pany, Monteilh said.

Each store has its own policy regarding the use of spoiled food, she said. The store has been the site of an organizing effort after employees complained of poor treatment by management. The company put up a vigorous campaign to persuade the employees not to unionize, but they voted to join the United Food and Commercial Workers Union in July by a vote of 65-54. The company appealed the vote to the National Labor Relations Board, and was turned down. The process of collective bargaining is expected to follow.

Union supporter Brendan OSullivan, a Whole Foods employee, said he expects the firings will lead to a complaint in front of that same board. There are a lot of people who are really upset, but I would say its not necessarily split between union supporters and non-union supporters. A lot of people like Debbie a lot at the store, and (the other woman), and so I think a lot of people are upset by what happened," OSullivan said. I think its pretty obvious that it was done because theyre both a big part of the unionizing effort, he added. The Capital rimes Though his term will likely last only six weeks, veteran Department of Transportation employee Tom Carlsen has been named secretary of the agency.

Gov. Scott McCallum, whose term expires Jan. 6, elevated Carlsen from the departments second-ranking job, deputy secretary, to secretary on Thursday. Carlsen had been serving as acting secretary since April, when he succeeded Gene Kussart, who became McCallums chief of staff. But McCallum spokesman Tim Roby said the governor decided to make the appointment offi cial in order to recognize Carlsens many years of service.

He began working for the department in 1964 as an engineer in training and has held jobs as a traffic engineer, chief of technical services, state design engineer and director of the departments division offices in Eau Claire and Madison. He retired from the department in 2001 to head a consultmg firm but returned to state service this year at McCallums request. His salary will remain the same. Carlsen I 4 Lt I 4.