THE
NOME NUGGET
"TTT NEWSPAPER IN ALASKA—MEMBER ASSOCIATED PRESS
63rd Year No. 109
NOME, ALASKA, FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1962
Per Copy 15£
Cuban Situation:
Kennedy Says U.S. Military Action
Is Not Now “Required or Justified"’
WASHINGTON W — President
Kennedy says U S. military action
against Cuba is not now “required
or justified.”
But he told his news conference
Thursday if the United States
should ever have to take action,
“all Castro’s Communist-supplied
weapons and technicians would
not change the result or signifi
cantly extend the time required to
achieve the result.”
At the same time, the President
admonished critics urging the ad
ministration to use military force
against the Communist outpost.
He said he finds it “regrettable
loose talk about such action in this
country might serve to give a thin
color of legitimacy to the Commu
nest pretense that such a threat
exists.”
The President said, as he has
said before, Cuba poses no serious
threat to the Western Hemisphere.
However, should the Castro re
gime — with Russian backing —
ever endanger the security of the
United States in any way “this
country will do wathever must be
done to protect its own security
and that of its Allies.”
This holds true, the President
declared, should Cuba ever threat
en any nation in this hemisphere
or should it ever develop into an
offensive base for Russia.
Will Intensify Watch
He said the United States will
intensify its watch over the Carib
bean area. But he said Washington
is aware of what goes on in Cuba
and is “fully capable of dealing
swiftly” with any genuine threats.
Kennedy opened the conference
with a statement on the situation
in Cuba, which has prompted de
mands in and out of Congress for
stiff action. Cuba remained the
dominant topic.
Kennedy did take the opportu
nity to condemn the burning of
two Negro churches and the shoot
ing of two Negroes during voter
registration in the south. He called
the actions “cowardly as well as
outrageous” and said the right to
vote and freedom of worship are
hallowed and will pe protected.
“If it requires extra legislation
and extra force,” he said, “we shall
do that.”
Kotzebue Residents
Seek Aid for Community
Two-hundred signatures of Kot
zebue residents and property own
ers are on a petition sent to Gov.
Wm. Egan requesting a survey and
investigation on what kind of aid
can be given them to repair the
damages done by the recent storm,
which wiped out their main street.
Tex Hoffman, Director of Rural
Development, passed through Nome
today enroute to Kotzebue to make
the study and report on the pos
sibilities of a community improve
ment project for that village. Mr.
Hoffman has been in the Bethel
area where community projects of
several kinds are underway.
He explained that the Rural De
velopment Fund is all state money
and is intended not only to im
prove and help small communities,
but relieve the welfare assistance,
giving work which will raise the
status of the residents.
A survey had not been made
earlier, as Kotzebue leaders had
indicated they did not wish state
aid.
The President said Castro had
committed himself to a Soviet
takeover in hope of preventing his
own collapse.
The chief executive said he dis
cussed Cuba, among other subjects,
with former President Dwight Ei
senhower Monday but did not seek
any agreement from Eisenhower to
bar Cuba as a congressional cam
paign issue. Neither, he said, would
he suggest that Republican shots
at his Cuban policy were political
ly motivated.
Kennedy said he and the Joint
Chiefs of Staff will analyze all
available intelligence to determine
whether or when Cuba does pre
sent an offensive threat. In the
meantine, he urged North Atlantic
Treaty Organization Allies to give
a second thought to allowing their
ships to carry supplies to Cuba
and called on Latin American
governments to be on the alert. He
said the United States will pay
no heed to Soviet threats of retalia
tion to a U.S. attack on Cuba —
that it does not need Moscow’s
help in making decisions.
SPACE PREDICTIONS
DAYTON, Ohio UPl — Barring
complications, the United States
will orbit a man for 24 hours early
next year, have three men in orbit
together by 1965 and be on the
moon by 1970 according to Brai
nerd Holmes, a National Aeronau
tics and Space Administration of
ficial.
Holmes outlined the space pro
gram Thursday to the Dayton
Chapter of the National Security
Industrial Assn.
Russian Spurns U.S. Offer
Of 14-Pound Fragment
Of Disintegrated Sputnik
UNITED NATIONS, N.Y. UPi —
The United States offered to the
Soviet Union today a 14-pound
fragment it said came from Sputnik
IV and landed in Manitowoc, Wis.,
in the early morning hours of
Sept. 5.
U.S. delegate Francis Plimpton
made the offer at a meeting of
the U.N. Committee on Peaceful
Uses of Outer Space.
Plimpton said the offer was a
concrete gesture of real coopera
tion in peaceful exploration of
outer space.
The step caught Planton Moro
zov, the Soviet delegate, by sur
prise and he made no immediate
move to accept the fragment for
study by Soviet scientists. Morozov
had just concluded an attack on
U.S. policy in the outer space
committee.
Plimpton said the fragment,
which weighed 20 lbs., had been
delivered promptly to the Smith
sonian Astrophvsical Laboratory
in Washington. He said scientists
there took off a 6 lb. slice in order
to study the origin of the fragment.
He said it landed in the street
in Manitowo and “fortunately
caused no damage.”
After the meeting was adjourned,
Morozov walked out of the com
mittee room without accepting the
fragment.
He told a reporter he consider
ed the offer “a circus trick in
tended to strengthen the U.S. posi
tion” against a Soviet-proposed
declaration of legal principles on
outer space exploration.
1 Astronaut Schirra:
John Glenn Jr.
Is Falling Behind
In His Spaee Work
NEW YORK W — Cmdr. Walter
Schirra Jr., slated for the nation’s
next manned space shot, says as
tronaut John Glenn Jr. has been
falling behind in space work be
cause of outside commitments.
Schirra told a network television
audience Thursday night the space
program needs the advice of Glenn,
one of two Americans already put
into orbit, but “his commitments
have just about wiped him out of
the space program.”
In a taped interview over CBS
TV “Our Next Man in Space,”
Schirra said:
“He (Glenn) hasn’t been able to
maintain the currency that he
should have with the rest of us.
And we have frantic meetings try
ing to keep each other up to date
on what he has been doing tech
nically. John's falling behind, in
other words.”
Schirra tentatively is scheduled
to make his orbital flight Sept. 28.
Since Glenn’s flight last Febru
ary, he has been making speeches,
granting interviews, testifying be
fore Congress, and briefing offi
cials up to and including Presi
dent Kennedy.
ov.miia CHUl auj UUl'
side commitments in his criticism
In Houston, Thursday night, A
Chop, deputy public affairs offh
cer for the manned spacecraft cen
ter, said Glenn has undergone
pressure for public appearance;
but has not fallen behind in hi;
training.
Schirra also contended space of
ficials “boo-booed” in not telling
the public where astronaut Scotl
Carpenter was during the 35 min
utes an anxious nation thought he
was lost after his capsule overshot
its landing last May 24.
“We had six beautiful radar
fixes within six miles of where
Scott landed,” Schirra said, “but
we had a lot of information there
and yet it never came out and it
was disgusting, you know,” Schirra
said.
“I don’t feel badly about har
pooning someone on this because
if they do it to me I’m going to
be furious because too many
people I know will be concerned,
and I think many were in Scott’s
cafee.”
It was brought out shortly after
the flight that Carpenter’s loca
tion was known but the informa
tion didn’t get to the public for
35 minutes.
Glenn Says He and Schirra
Are Still Good Friends
HOUSTON UP) — Lt. Col. John
Glenn Jr. said today he and his
astronaut teammate, Wally Schir
ra, are good friends and “I will
certainly continue to support his
flight just as well as I possibly
can.”
Glenn and Dr. Robert R. Gil
ruth, director of the Manned
Spacecraft Center, released pre
pared statements this afternoon
after conferring nearly four hour;
and studying the text of Schirra’;
telecast.
Gilruth said there is no real con
troversy existing regarding Glenn’s
position in the space program oi
on other questions raised by Schir
ra.
WEATHER FORECAST
Mostly cloudy with little change
in temperature.
Five Injured and
Infant is Dead
In Crash at Candle
FAIRBANKS LV — Mrs. Fred
j Erickson told today of seeing mem
bers of her family floating on their
banks in the icy waters of the
Candle River after a plane piloted
by her husband crashed on takeoff
at Candle Wednesday evening.
The 25-year-old mother, who lost
the youngest of her three children
in the crash, spoke from a hospital
I bed where she is being treated for
leg fractures and severe cuts.
Mrs. Erickson was unaware of
the fate of her husband until to
day, when she was informed that
Fred ‘‘Swede” Erickson, 30, re
mains in critical condition at the
Nome hospital.
Aboard the plane in addition to
the parents were their children:
Barbara, 6; Jo Anne, 16 months;
Jacquelyn Rene, 1 month; and
Mrs. Erickson’s sister, Nancy, 17.
“I remember what sounded like
something crashing into the wing,"
the mother recalled. “Then we just
fell.”
After the crash she saw her hus
band and Barbara floating on then
backs in the river.
“Nancy was getting out the
other side of the plane while I was
trying to pull myself out of the
cockpit. My legs were caught in
the wreckage. My right leg was
pinned between the airplane and
rocks in the bottom of the river.
“When I finally managed to pull
my legs free I crawled through the
water to Jo Anne who was stand
: ing in the water crying, holding
her arms to me.”
Mrs. Erickson remembers hand
ing little Jacqueline Rene to some
one from the village who heard the
crash and came running. Although
unable to walk, the mother man
aged to carry Jo Anne to shore.
Mrs. Erickson does not yet know
that her baby died enroute to
Kotzebue where the other children
were taken.
Erickson is a former Wien bush
pilot who had mined at Candle
this summer and was taking his
family to Fairbanks.
Kennedy Urges
^1 issile - Space
Producers to Adopt
The Union Shop
WASHINGTON UP . President
Kennedy has called on four balk
ing missile-space producers to
adopt the union shop or bear re
sponsibility for disastrous strikes.
The union shop, Kennedy told
his news conference Thursday, is
an accepted fact in American in
dustry.
The President spoke out strong
ly in behalf of a White House
board recommendation that the
Lockheed, Convair, North Ameri
can and Ryan firms require their
100,000 workers to be union mem
bers provided the workers give
prior approval by a two-thirds
vote.
"If there is a strike,” Kennedy
said, noting two unions involved
have accepted the board’s peace
formula, "the responsibility would
be very clear, I think, to the Amer
ican people for such action.”
The President’s comments were
in response to a question as to
whether he felt the unions, having
accepted while the companies have
not, were being forced into a strike
against the key government sup
pliers of space and missile equip
ment and planes.
In endorising his Aerospace
Board report favoring the union
shop for the Lockheed, Convair,
North American and Ryan firms,
Kennedy said the required union
membership proviso had been
adopted years ago by most other
major U.S. industries, including
auto, steel and aluminum pro
ducers.
Kennedy noted that in this case
the two-thirds worker ratification
condition gives the workers a
veto.
The Machinists said the unions,
the AFL-CIO Auto Workers and
Machinists, were agreeing to take
a recommended wage increase that
; was "not particularly generous,”
■ and well within the administration
economic guideposts.
Stepovich Accuses
Egan of Reckless Financial Policies
By Ward Sims
Associated Press Staff Writer
ANCHORAGE W*! — Republican
gubernatorial candidate Mike j
Stepovich accused the Egan admin
istration today of reckless financial
policies and confusion which has
hampered the operation of state
agences.
Stepovich, who will meet the
Democratic incumbent, Wm. Egan
in the Nov. 6 general election,
told 86 delegates and 28 alternate
delegates to the GOP State Con
vention:
“I charge that the Egan admin
istration is hiding behind the
financial crisis it faces, the failures
in its program, and the problems
it has created for the future.”
Stepovich said Egan, during ap
pearance here, “gave an impression
that Alaska right now is $20 mil
lion to the good. That is far from
the truth.
“We would have a balance of
$20 million, perhaps, if we stop
ped paying our bills for a year.
Our estimated balance for the cur
rent fiscal year is about $3 million
—not $20 million.”
To balance his budgets, Stepo
vich said, Egan has used statehood
cash grants, which run out in
1963, and unpredictable oil income
to pay day to day expenses of
government.
"Gotten Nothing" . . .
“The tragedy of the situation is
the fact that we have gotten noth
ing out of all this spending,” Stepo
vich said. “Show me a monument
to the Egan administration.
“Is it our road system? No. The
road improvement program has
been in a state of confusion
throughout the past four years. Ad
ministrators have been hired and
fired and plans have been changed
but still the road program remains
far behind schedule.
“Is our ferry system coming
along satisfactorily, do we have a
vocational school at Nome, have
any major goals of the Egan ad
ministration been met? We can
not find one major accomplish
ment of the present administra
tion.”
“. . . The vast sums of money
that have been spent by the pre
sent administration have gone to
meet the salary expense of an in
flated government, to finance
waste, and to build a political ma
chine that is now dictating to all
of us. . .
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