SIS NOME NUGGET
OLDEST NEWSPAPER IN ALASKA—MEMBER ASSOCIATED PRESS
63rd Year No. 101
INUM1., ALASKA, 1KIIMV, AUl.l SI 24, 1962
Per Copy 15C
AEC Has Shelved 1
Laverne Madigan
Killed In Fall
From Horse
I
BARTON. Vt. IT1—Mrs. Laverne j
M. Vordewick, 48, of Yonkers, 1
N. Y., executive director of the As
sociation on American Indian Af
fairs, was killed Tuesday in a fall
from a horse while on vacation.
Known professionally as Laverne
Madigan, she had been director of
the association since 1956 and i
worked with the organization
since 1953.
Oliver Lafarge, writer and presi
dent of the association, said:
“Laverne Madigan was one of
the great champions the Indians
ever had. She was understanding,
wise and fearless. Extremely dif
ficult though it will be to fill her
place, all those who worked with
her are pledged to carry on her
service to the Indian people and
to the natives of Alaska.”
State Police said Mrs. Vorde
wick was horseback riding with
her son, Fergus, and two friends.
She suffered a skull fracture and
was dead on arrival at Newport
Hospital.
House of Seagram
Charged With
Price Fixing
WASHINGTON </P> — The Justice
Department asked the courts today
to prohibit the Houe of Seagram
Inc., from fixing prices on liquor
throughout the nation.
Attv. Gen. Robert Kennedy said
the order was requested in a civil
anti-trust suit filed simultaneously
with a criminal information against
the House of Seagram in U.S. Dis
trict Court in Miami, Fla.
Seagram was charged specific
ally in both actions with conspir
ing to fix wholesale prices and dic
tate retail prices for liquor sold
in southern Florida.
But the petition asked for an
order against such practices on a
nation-wide basis.
The House of Seagram, with
headquarters in New York City,
sells and distributes virtually all of
the distilled products of Joseph E.
Seagram & Sons, Inc., the nation’s
biggest distiller. Seagram & Sons
grossed more than $170 million in
the year ending July 31, 1961, and
had assets exceeding $456 million,
the court was told.
The government cited seven al
leged violations by Seagram of the
Sherman Anti-trust act or Federal
Trade Commissions Act since 1938.
Kennedy said a separate crimin
al action filed in Miami today
charged 20 southern Florida retail
liquor stores and eight of their
executives with price-fixing and
suppressing competition. This did
not involve Seagram.
BUILDINGS ON FRONT ST.
HAVING FACE LIFTED
Considerable improvement to
property is being done on the
south side of Front Street.
Ivan Johnson, contractor, com
pleted a new face on the Break
er's Bar of stained wood, which
has been duplicated on the front
of the Billikin Shop, which has a
different trim.
M’Lord and Lady Shop also has
a fresh new store front of natural j
wood.
Vojeet Chariot
By the Associated. Press
The Atomic Energy Commission
has shelved, at least for the time
being, its proposal to blast out a
harbor on the Northwest Alaska
coast with a nuclear explosion.
The way the AEC put it was
this:
‘‘The Atomic Energy Commission
has recently reviewed plans for
Project Chariot . . . and has de
cided to defer, for the present, any
recommendations to the President
on whether to conduct the experi
ment."
The announcement was made si
multaneously today in Washington,
D.C., and Berkeley, Calif.
Information Already Available
The AEC said some of the in
formation which had been hoped
for from the Alaska project al
ready is available or may be ob
tained through other experiments.
“As new data are developed they
will be evaluated with respect to
their possible influence on the role
the Chariot experiment could play
in the overall program,” the AEC
added.
The Commission said its studies
have indicated no danger to the
inhabitants of the area or to fish
and wildlife from the proposed
blast. It said the studies have pro
vided useful information and a
report on them will be published
soon.
l he ALU said i'roject vnariot
was designed, among other things,
to provide information on forma
tion of craters and on the distribu
tion and effects of radioactivity
from such explosions.
Project Chariot was first an
nounced by the AEC on June 9,
1918. The Commission said a har
bor would be blasted out between
Cape Seppings and Cape Thomp
son if studies showed it was safe
and practicable. Lack of harbors
in the area hampered development
of mineral deposits and fishing,
the AEC said.
In January, 1962, the AEC said
scientific investigations were con
tinuing but no decision had been
made.
The proposal called for simul
taneously detonating underground,
at a depth of about 400 feet, four
20-kiloton nuclear explosive to ex
cavate a ship channel and one 200
kiloton nuclear explosive at about
800 feet to excavate a turning
basin.
The channel was expected to be
900 feet wide, 200 feet deep in the
deepest part and 2.000 feet long.
The channel would connect the
basin with the ocean. The basin
was expected to be 1,800 feet in
diameter and 400 feet deep at the
deepest part.
Cost $3 Million
The cost of the surveys and in
vestigations which have been made
for Project Chariot is estimated
at more than three million dollars.
The studies were conducted bv sci
entists whose fields ranged from
biology and human geography to
geology, oceanography and mete
orology.
The Alaskan congressional dele
gation said the Cape Thompson site
would be put on caretaker status.
SENDS GREETINGS
Friends of Barbara McKinnis,
former laboratory and X-ray tech
nician at the MMM Hospital, will
be located soon at the Mora Valley
medical unit in New Mexico. This
unit is sponsored by the Presby
terian Church.
She sends greetings to her many
friends in Nome.
Drug Safety Bill
Sails Through Senate
WASHINGTON — A drug ,
safety bill born in storms- contro- j
vorsy two years ago has sailed '
easily through the Senate without
opposition.
Its way cleared by public con
cern touched off by the sedative
thalidomide, the measure was sent
on to the House Thursday by a
78-0 vote.
A House committee is holding
hearings on a companion bill,
similarly designed to strengthen
safeguards against the marketing
of dangerous and infective drugs.
The only sharp disagreement in
the Senate debate was over an
amendment sponsored by the bill's
author, Sen. Estes Kefauver, <D
Tenn.t.
The Senate rejected 53-28 his
effort to require compulsory licens
ing of drug patents when there is
a 500 per cent markup in the price
to pharmacists.
Kefauver contended prices of
prescription drugs arc “outrage
ously high” and the only way to
assure substantial reductions is to
break up patent monopolies by
compulsory licensing.
Sen. James Eastland, (D-MissJ,
chairman of the Senate Judiciary
Committee, which handled the bill,
.said adoption of Kefauver’s amend
ment would “destroy all incentive
to make investments for drug re
search” and be “a crime against
humanity.”
| Interior Dept. Will
Permit Sale of Alaska
Fur Seal by Fouke Co.
WASHINGTON t/P) — The In
terior Department will permit sales
of Alaska fur seal skins in Green
ville, S.C., in October, Sen. Olin
Johnston, <D-S.C.», said today.
After a meeting with Secretary
Stewart Udall and J. T. Fouke,
president of the Fouke Fur Co.,
Johnston announced that the de
partment is amending a contract
with the firm to allow the sales.
Until now the department de
clined to permit the company to
sell furs except in St. Louis, Mo.,
where it was doing business prior
to opening its Greenville plant.
The company processes furs from
government reservations and the
Arctic areas in Alaska. Johnston
said. The Greenville plant employs
145 and expects to expand, he
added.
Cloudy Skies Over State
Fair to partly cloudy skies
covered wide areas of Alaska to
day as the state got a break in the !
cloudy weather which has plagued
most regions for the past several
days.
Cloudy skies continued to blan
ket the Southeast Panhandle, but
the steady rain of the past few days
turned into intermittent rain
showers.
Other areas of inclement weath
er included the Tanana and Min
chumina sections of the interior,
the west slopes of the Alaska
range, the Norton Sound area, the
Aleutians and the Arctic slope.
Barrow and Barter Island both
reported snow flurries during the
night, but a south wind at Barrow
changed the snow to rain early
this morning.
Early mornin g temperatures
ranged from a low of 31 at Barter
Island to a high of 54 at Annette
Island. The high yesterday was 64
at Annette Island and McGrath.
British Court
Orders Sobien
To Be Deported
LONDON — Britain’s high
court uphold today a government
order for deportation of Dr. Robert
Sobien to the United States, where
he faces a life sentence as a Soviet
spy.
So! Ion's application for a writ of
habeas corpus was rejected.
But return of the bail-jumping
61-vear-old psychiatrist to the
United States was deferred again.
Soblen's attorneys announced
they will petition Monday for an
appeal and expect the Court of
Appeals to hear it Wednesday. If
they lose there they may take the
case to the House of Lords, Bri
tain’s highest tribunal. Then pro
ceedings would drag on for another
month.
The prisoner, who has leukemia,
will remain in the Brixton prison
hospital in the interval. Denied
the right to stay in Britain, he
is still hoping for a chance to seek
asylum elsewhere.
Justice John Stephenson reject
ed Soblen’s challenge to the de
portation order, issued by Home
Secretary Henry Brooke.
The judge said the Home Secre
tary, not the deportee, had the
authority to choose the ship or
plane on which the deportee had
to leave Britain. In this case,
Brooke has specified that Sobler
be placed aboard a New York
bound plane.
| His attorneys said Sobien is dan
| gerouslv ill and would not live Ion.:
| if confined in a U.S. federal prison
' Attv. Gen. Sir John Hobson saic
| a medical specialist found durim
1 recent examination that the fugi
tive is in no immediate danger ot
death and th it his condition had
not deteriorated. Hobson said
Solben is destined for tlie medical
detention center at Springfield,
Mo., where adequate care would be
assured.
The health angle did not figure
in the court's judgment.
Absentee Votes
Give Doris Sweeney
Nod Over Bill Ray
JUNEAU (.P> — A count of ab
sentee ballots in the 4th District
today gave Rep. Dora Sweeney of
Juneau the second of two Demo
cratic nominations for the State
House of Representatives.
Mrs. Sweeney and Bill Ray, also
of Juneau, were running neck and
neck when the count of absentee
ballots started this morning, with
Sweeney 694 to 687.
Mrs. Sweeney picked up 70 ab
sentee ballots, however, while Ray
got only 49, leaving the final, un
official count at 764-736 in favor of
Mrs. Sweeney.
Dr. William Whitehead of Ju
neau won the No. 1 Democratic
nomination easily.
The only two Republican candi
dates were A. W. Bockly and Linn
Forrest Jr., both of Juneau.
Jasper Heath, FAA, Visits Nome
Jasper Heath, of FAA. passed
through Nome yesterday from his
home in Wasilla where he has been
a resident for many years.
Mr. Heath is building near his
home Alaska’s first “Fly-In” which
is the equivalent to a motel for
air-minded individuals touring in
their own planes and wishing to
avoid the traffic at big airports.
Modern housing is being pro
vided, service of all kinds for the
airplane and peace and quiet for
the vacationers in Alaska.
S\vr?i is 11 Profrssor
.Wiik<\s 300AIil<>
Trek Across Alaska
FAIRBANKS .? —• A Swedish
professor who successfully chal
lenged the wilderness in a 300-mile
hike alone across. Arctic Alaska de
scribed the trek today as "a little
tougher than I expected."
“It was tough. It was interest
ing and in some way- fascinating,’’
Dr. Rune Lindgren, visiting pro
fessor at Johns Hopkins University,
said in an interview.
The 42-year-old professor from
Stockholm is believed to be one of
only a handful of white men to
have ever walked from the Arctic
Coast across the rugged Brooks
Mountain Range to Interior Alas
ka.
“You have to really work at it.
Some days I was able to make only
three miles — one day I made
16.” Lindgren said.
“The toughest part was wading
the rivers. When I started the
rains were just starting up in the
hills and the rivers were getting
higher.
I 1 tail l L'Vt'Il I Li lit . 11 Utl 11 (J \ v
! many rivers and streams had to
| be crossed.”
Lindgren left Demarcation Point
j on the coast July 19 and walked
j into Arctic Village, nearly 250
i miles north of here, four weeks
! later.
j He said when he set out he was
carrying about 90 pounds of equip
j ment and supplies including a pis
: tol, sleeping bag, light tent and
. ; two cameras. Additional food was
; 1 air-dropped when he reached the
| midway point.
The professor, who has hiked
extensively in Sweden and Lap
land, said the challenge of one of
the last undisturbed wilderness
areas of the northern hemisphere
| was his main reason for making
I the hike.
"I love nature, animals and
1 people,” he added. "But I also have
a strong desire for solitude at
j times and 1 hate roadside tables
and camping sites.”
Lindgren said he saw lots of
game including caribou and bear
—one a large grizzly — but was
j not bothered by the animals.
Once, while wading a stream, he
| saw three wolves standing on a
bank watching him.
“They just stood there and
watched — curious, I suppose,” he
said. "When l found a place to
climb out, they were gone. I heard
them that night, but never saw
them again.”
Lindgren is undergoing physi
cal testing at the Air Force Aero
medical Laboratory here. He leaves
Monday to return to the univer
sity.
Anaktuvuk Pass
BaRots Ruled Invalid
Juneau UP — State Atty. Gen.
George Hayes ruled today that 2f>
votes cast in Anaktuvuk Pass eight
days prior to the Aug. 14 primary
election were invalid.
Hayes ruled, however, that 18
absentee ballots sent in from the
little Eskimo village in the Brooks
Range between Fairbanks and
Barrow could be counted.
Precinct officials at Anaktuvuk
Pass, for some unexplained rea
son, decided to hold their primary
election on Aug. 6, instead of on
Aug. 14. The marked ballots were
sent to Nome.
State Elections Director Jack
McFarland instructed the elections
supervisor at Nome to leave the
envelope in which the ballots were
sent sealed until Hayes ruled on
the validity of the early election.