The Salina Journal from Salina, Kansas • Page 3

The Salina Journal Monday, June 27,1988 Regulators find fault with plant Group gives poor marks to Wolf Creek BURLINGTON (AP) The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has found fault with seven of 11 safety- related areas at the Wolf Creek nuclear power plant, stated a federal report released Saturday. "It is my view that, although two areas showed an increase in per- fprmance, there is an overall undesirable reduction in performance at Creek Generating Station," eaid Robert Martin, regional administrator of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Arlington Texas. For the first time since receiving its operating license in 1985, Wolf Creek received the lowest mark possible in two categories: power outages and quality control programs. I- The annual report evaluated the performance of plant operators and workers from March 1987 through March 1988. Regulators cited declining performances in five of 11 safety-related areas.

Declining trends were reported in two other areas, although ratings remained unchanged. Gains in were cited in two areas. performance in all other functional areas, except for sur- and emergency preparedness, has either declined or $hows a declining trend," the report stated. The commission had planned no disciplinary action against the plant, said Joe Gilliland, a commission spokesman. "It's true our performance didn't our expectations in some of the areas, especially in regard to the outage," said Ronn Smith, a spokesman for the Wolf Creek Nu- Operating Corp.

"But we've feken steps to improve our perform- $nce. 3 Smith said most of the criticism in report related to problems during power outage last fall. The problems, including the electrocution of a worker, resulted in a fine in March. tTexas woman dies in one-car accident OBERLIN A Texas woman was fulled early Sunday on U.S. Highway 83 south of Oberlin when she was thrown from the car she was driving.

Tiffany Butts, 18, Kermit, Texas, $as going south when the car she was driving went off the east side of the rpad and rolled, said a spokesman for Ispe Decatur County Sheriff's Department, Butts was pronounced dead at the accident occurred about 3:15 Celebrating 75 Photos by Ben Harris Sherri Lqop shows off an antique Red Cross volunteer uniform and a nun's habit for nurses that has been in style since the 1920s. St. John's to open 'Hall of Hospital History' ByCAROLLICHTI Staff Writer Several months ago, Sherri Loop knew little about the history of the hospital where she works. She knew only that Salina's St. John's Hospital was built in 1914 and belonged to the Sisters of St.

Joseph in Concordia. Today, after hours of researching newspaper articles and collecting items from in the community, the hospital's maintenance secretary is putting the final touches on the "HaU of Hospital History." The hall is a mini-museum designed to educate visitors about how the institution was started and what a patient in the hospital could have expected to see during the past 74 years. A special opening of the museum, planned for 3 p.m. Tuesday, is the first celebration kicking off the hospital's 75th anniversary. Special activities are being planned for each month during the next year as part of the anniversary.

With her new knowledge of the hospital's history, Loop is convinced the institution's future will be healthy. "Once people see how the hospital came to be, they will know it will always be here," she said. The experience also has shown her how health care has changed. "In the early days, people came to the hospital to die," Loop said. These items will be on display at St.

John's Hospital. "Now they come to live." Loop learned that in 1912, Bishop C.F. Cunningham determined a hospital was needed in Salina. The bishop and the parish of Sacred Heart Church gave their shares of a tract of land on North Penn Street for the hospital. A remaining share was purchased.

At the tune, Father John Maher offered on behalf of his parish to furnish $25,000 of the $100,000 anticipated as the cost to build the hospital. The contributors are inscribed on the outside of the building on the north and south sides of the lobby entrance. The remaining $75,000 came from people of all faiths in the community, Loop said. "For years and years I thought of it as 'the Catholic' hospital," Loop said. But most of the money came from the community, she said.

The final cost of the project was $135,600. On May 1, 1913, Cunningham turned the first shovel of soil in a ground-breaking ceremony. The hospital was dedicated on June 28, 1914, as the "house of man." The chapel, on the third floor, later was dedicated as' 'the house of The first patient was admitted in July of 1914. During the rest of that year, 75 patients entered the hospital. Now, the hospital has about 71,000 admissions a year.

In 1914, Dr. J.D. Riddell headed the staff of 14 doctors. About 50 years later, 52 medical doctors and 23 doctors of dental surgery were on staff. Now there are 121 practicing physicians on staff and a dental surgery staff of 24.

Visitors to the hall can see instruments of various sizes; an examining table used by Dr. W.R. Dillingham, who practiced from 1925 to 1943; the light pole that used to sit outside the hospital; and scalpels that were used in the early 1900s. The hall also displays volunteer uniforms worn in the 1940s and 1950s, and a nun's nursing habit with everything "down to the long underwear," Loop said. The white nun's habit was not worn by nurses until the 1920s.

Before that, nuns wore a black habit with a white apron, Loop said. The opening of the mini-museum on the hospital's main floor will be followed each month by special activities such as a birthday party for everyone born in the hospital, a 1914 dress day, a 1914 food day and an antique clothing fashion show. Festivities before the opening of the hall Tuesday are scheduled for 2 p.m. and include food, speeches and a brief history of the hospital. Lindsborg woman pioneers automobile business By DAN HESS Staff Writer PtlNDSBORG Hildur Ek was born during tjie horse and buggy era of the early 1900s, but tjiat only served to heighten her appreciation the automobile.

J. As the automobile became a prominent part of the American lifestyle, Ek was contributing tp the rise of the industry. She was co-owner of an auto supply store in Kansas City from 1935 to 1956. the growth of the automobile industry was the reason she moved from Kansas City to Lindsborg in 1970. couldn't compete with the traffic there (Kansas City) but I could compete in In 1912, long before "super highways" Inter- $ates 70 and 135 were thought of, Ek got her first taste of the open road.

Her first trip by car to Lindsborg was in her uncle's Model Ford. A dozen flat tires and a blowout on the 200-mile drive, known as the Golden Belt Route, made tfie, trip memorable. The road U.S. 40 was paved with sand, gravel or macadam and wound through lopeka, Silver Lake, Wamego, St. George, Junction City, Chapman, Abilene, Splbmon and New Cambria.

Tom Dorsey Hildur Ek, Lindsborg, ran an early automobile parts business. Ek said it was more fun in those days to drive a car and get lost than it is now to drive down the modern highways. The slower pace of the car allowed the passenger to see more and become a part of the scenery with no fences serving as a barrier. Her first car was a Model which she bought for $525 in 1925. The Model was one of 14 cars Ek would own and it was always her favorite.

"I never had as much fun as I did in that Model she said. Ek got her first taste of auto parts when she worked for a pair of auto supply stores from 1924 to 1935. She met and married her husband, Arthur, in 1929 and the pair opened what was known as Wyandotte Motor Supply in 1935. In 1939, Hildur Ek was believed to be one of two women in the United States who played a major role in running an auto supply house. However, Ek said she didn't find it strange that a woman in the 1930s would understand what a customer wanted when he asked for a downdraft carburetor.

"That didn't bother me at all," Ek said. "I had no trouble at all. I didn't need a woman's organization behind me then." The Eks opened the shop with little inventory springs, main leaves, piston rings and brake lining. The business grew from the start, but it took off when they purchased a drum lathe to attract truck business. Later, they added an all-sizes crankshaft grinder a rarity in the Midwest to the machine shop, and business boomed.

"If you have something nobody else has, you'll get ahead," Ek said. "We didn't have any sickness or children, so we put all we had into our business. "We slept, ate and drank auto supply. Every year we made a little improvement. If you do that for 20 years, you improve a lot." Twenty-one years after its birth, the Eks sold the business in March of 1956.

Arthur died in September of the following year. In 1959, she opened Scandinavian shops in downtown Kansas City, and Westport. The shop had gifts and decorator items in contemporary and traditional designs from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. When she moved to Lindsborg, she opened a Scandinavian needlework shop, retiring after six years to start writing. She has written eight books, including "Omar's Biography," the story of her cat; "Off the Beaten Path in Sweden;" "Growing Up in Kansas City;" and "Visiting the Bible Lands." Her books have sold more than 8,000 copies.

Information sought about theft A recent theft has been selected "by the Saline County Sheriff's -Department as the crime of the Iweek for Crimestoppers, a non- Iprofit organization that pays cash to people who help solve A 14-foot fiberglass fishing boat fwas taken from where it was -parked on the bank qf the Solomon located in the northeast of Saline County, sometime between 11:30 p.m. May 22 land 6 p.m. May 26. The Sears fiberglass boat is described as being green with tan fiberglass patching along its bottom and sides. Also taken along with the boat.

were two orange life jackets, two Kansas City Royals seat cushions and two plastic oars. Total loss was reported at $425. Anyone with information about, this crime or any other crimes can call Crimestoppers at 8252000. Callers may receive up to a $1,000 reward. Callers are not required to give their names.

Suspect's belongings to be sold KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) A number of Robert A. Berdella's personal belongings including ancient artifacts, furniture and jewelry are scheduled to be auctioned off in Roger Porter, owner of Cable Car Auction and Realty, said many of the possessions come from Bob's Bazaar Bizarre, Berdella's jewelry and art store in Kansas City. "We've got it all," Porter said. "We are beginning to catalog it and have experts look at it so that we can advertise it properly.

"It's going to be a fun one, because of the complexities of the situation involving Bob Berdella." Berdella, who is being held in the Jackson County Jail, was arrested April 2 and later charged with felonious restraint and sodomy after a man escaped from Berdella's home and told police Berdella had tortured him for several days. Kansas City police found a man's skull hi Berdella's back yard and another in his house but have not filed murder charges. Porter said the site and date of the auction would be revealed about a week before the auction. The auction, which does not include Berdella's house, was authorized by Sharlie Pender, a Kansas City lawyer. Fender said Berdella also approved the sale.

Items on the auction block include: pre-Columbian figurines; a pale beige, medallion-back Victorian sofa; Tibetan masks and bronze figures; African wood statues; an oil lamp from the Byzantine empire; a clay pitcher from the Bronze Age; beads, vases, gold, shawls, and display cases; and two Roman pottery plates. Larry Mathews SENIOR ASSOCIATE EDITOR wmjww ring be reunited? Somewhere, possibly in Tennessee, "JWW" is bemoaning the loss of his 1988 high school class ring. Meanwhile, Cuff stuff in Salina, Jack Copeland has turned detective and is running up quite a phone bill in his determination to find JWW and return the ring to him. Our story begins three weekends ago, when Jack an avid fisherman was putting his boat in the water at Wilson Reservoir for some solo fishing. He saw something glisten on the lake bottom in about three feet of water.

It was a brand new, expensive- looking class ring. "Franklin County High" was inscribed around a purple stone. Also inscribed was the name "John" along with a cannon and a rebel flag. And on the inside were the initials "JWW." Jack got to checking. Kansas has a Franklin County, but no high school is there.

So he called Jack Green, a counselor at South High School, and asked him to check his atlas. He learned there is a Franklin County, just over the border. A call to the telephone company got the name of the school system there. But again no Franklin County High, and no students with the initials JWW. So Jack went back to the atlas.

It revealed an overwhelming 28 states with a Franklin County. What to do? Then Jack played a long shot. He knew the Josten Company makes class rings. So he called Randy Johnson, the company's local representative, who came up with a toll- free number and a company contact. A call got the wheels to spinning.

A Josten's representative ran a computer check and, using the ring's description, pinpointed the salesman who had sold it. The salesman Harold in Winchester, and, yes, there is a Franklin County High School there. The last word Jack had from Josten's is that they haven't yet been able to run down any student there with the initials JWW. But when they do, they will let Jack know. Then he can mail the student the ring and, maybe, learn how a recent high school graduate from Tennessee happened to lose his ring at a reservoir in Kansas.

So how was Jack's day otherwise on that fishing expedition three weekends ago? It went just fine, thank you. In addition to fishing out the ring, he caught his limit of walleye and a nice string of white bass. The wait is over for Randy Waite, the longtime "English teacher at Salina Central High School who put in an appearance on the "Jeopardy" TV game show. We had reported in this space that Randy was accepted for the show as a result of taking a test last summer while vacationing in Los Angeles. He and his wife flew there in late March to tape the show, in which contestants try to provide the right questions to a series of answers.

The show is scheduled to be aired at 4:30 p.m. Thursday over Channel 12. How did Randy do? We can't tell you because Randy won't tell us. Contestants are instructed to tell no one in advance about how much they didn't the show. From the mouths of babes: Mrs.

Craig Brumbaugh, who lives south of Logan, was driving her young son into Logan the other day to pre-enroll for kindergarten. Trying to smooth his path for the traumatic transition into the world of formal learning, she said: "Now, Wade, they may ask you some questions to see what you know." They drove in silence for a time as Wade considered that possibility. Then he said: "Dole DID drop out of the race, didn't he?" Mrs. Brumbaugh later wrote to the Kansas senator to share the political wisdom of her pre-kindergartner. Leonard Sekavec quotes the Town Clown at Holyrood: "People who live in glass houses make interesting neighbors." Got an item for Cuff Stuff? Call Larry Mathews at 823-6363, or write to the Salina Journal, 333 S.

Fourth, Salina, Kan. 67401..