San Antonio Express from San Antonio, Texas • Page 147

9 MPSGm OX 3 RDS OOX 3 RD IS PRESENTED TO DENISE BALLENGEE 4410 Summer Wind ROOSEVELT HIGH SCHOOL Denise Ballengee is an Outstanding participant in the Vocational Industrial Clubs of America (VICA) program. Daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James W. Ballengee, 4410 Summer Wind, Denise was 1975-76 president of VICA at Roosevelt High school.

She was secretary in 1974-75. Denise won first place in the statewide Speed Skill Olympics and will compete in the National Olympics in Miami June 12-17. Her chosen field is cosmetology and she is employed by Hair Affair. She also works for the Coffee Shop catering service. interests include skating, swimming, water skiing and arts and crafts.

1 he Optimist Club of San Antonio plans to honor Denise for her achievements. CONGRATULATIONS Death closes an era Phil Ochs NEW YORK The last sad chapter in Phil Ochs's up-and-down life story ended here April 9, when he hanged himself in his home in Far Rockaway, Queens. Ochs was 35 years old. PAGE 6EXPRESS-NfWS SUNDAY 30, 1976 Although Ochs's clever, biting lyrics earned him fame during the Sixties as the troubadour of the New Left, his musical career had been ailing for years and he had. according to family and friends, grown increasingly despondent.

Last December. Ochs moved from Manhattan to his sister Sonny house in Queens. In Manhattan he had ir- tually lived in the streets, moving from one hotel to another or staying with friends, who were concerned with his drinking. When he moved out to Queens, he stopped drinking and spent much of his time playing cards with his sister's three children. According to friends.

Ochs had been trying, off and on, to write again, hut had lost his confidence. last real public performance was October 23, 1975, at a birthday party for Mike Porco, owner of Gerde's Folk City, the scene of early triumphs. During an evening of all-star sets by the likes of Dylan, Joan Baez and Jack Elliott, Ochs (wearing hat) sang a poignant if hoarse set of Jimmy Brown the New You Go, I'oo Many Parties," "The Blue and the Gray," and a mov ing version of Down Your Weary that drew praise from its composer. That party amounted to a dress rehearsal for Dy Rolling Thunder Rev tie, but when the Revue pulled out of town four days later. ()rhs was not on the bus.

Close friends said that Phil had "understood" that there would he a place for him on the tour but that the i it at ion vv as ncv er tendered because of his "unpredictable behav and drinking, and that he understood that, too. Ochs and Dylan had had a stormy relationship over the years. They met in the early Sixties when they were the center of a tight circle including Dave Van Rom. Dav id Tom Paxton and Erie Andersen that hung around the offices of the mimeographed topical song publication. Dylan was clearly the star, while Debs was clear By 1 IET FLIPPO ly number two; but Ochs believed he could go just as far as Dy Ian Dylan could be cruel about his competition: when Dylan first played "Can You Please I Out our indow for Ochs, Phil said lie didn't think it would he a hit.

Dylan turned on him. ordering Ochs out of the limousine they were riding with the parting shot, ''You're not a folksinger; you're just a journalist." Ochs later laughed about the incident to Dylan biographer Tony Seaduto: "lie used to being criti- Still, it marked the end of their friendship. During the past two years, after Ochs moved hack to New York from Angeles, he and Dylan came to something of a truce. Ochs helped organize the 197-1 Madison Square Garden tribute to Salvador Allende at which Dylan appeared. Then, not long after Blood on the Tracks came out.

they ran into each other on MaeDougal Street and Ochs chided Dylan for getting away from topical writing with a gentle not good enough. Bob At the time of Ochs's death, Dylan was in Florida rehearsing lor the Southern swing of his Rolling Thunder tour A friend who talked briefly with him said Dylan was by the suicide, hut would have no statement to make. Phil Ochs was born in FI Paso, Texas; grew up in New York; was graduated from Staunton Military Academy in Virginia; then entered Ohio State I diversity in the late Fifties. lie spent his first two years there as a nonmajor. Then Ochs was jailed for days in Florida on a vagrancy rap, and it was there that he decided to become a wl iter Back at Ohio State, he declared himself a journalism major and began publishing a little radical sheet called in which that Fidel astro (together vv ith John See III.