The North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 62, No. 82, Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 7, 1979 Page: 4 of 8
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T
PAGE 4—THE NORTH TEXAS DAILY
Biological crossroads of America
4
add diversity to Texas setting
By SANDRA GUERRA
Daily Reporter
Thick, leafy vines trail down the low-
hanging tree limbs, brushing the surface
of the cool, green-tinted water below.
Amid the deep mosses on the bank, a
fragile violet orchid grows in the dark,
moist earth. Only the constant buzzing
of insects and an occasional birdcall
penetrate the thick shroud of silence
that envelopes the spot.
Alien to the images above, the next
area is arid and desolate. A deep tur-
quoise sky, indicative of the desert-like
climate, looks down on white-flowering
yucca plants, scrub bushes and sandy
soil.
Normally, these two extremes might
be found on different continents,
perhaps separated by miles of ocean.
Surprisingly, ine above aicas arc found
in East Texas’ Big Thicket National
Preserve. The tropical vegetation and
the dry, sandy land are two of the many
ecosystems of the Big Thicket, termed by
many scientists as “the biological cross-
roads of America."
Pine forest, swamps, bayous and
prairie, or savannah, may be found in
the various land units and river cor-
ridors of the 84,550-acre area in the
southeast corner of the state.
ONE OF THE biggest problems we
have encountered in saving the Big
Thicket is convincing people that this
really exists in Texas,” Dr. Peter Gunter
said during a lecture and slide presenta-
tion in the University Union recently.
“It certainly does not look like anything
John Wayne ever stumbled across.”
The hour-long slide program took the
small audience of students and faculty
on a tour of the many hiking trails and
streams of the Big Thicket. “The thing
that stands out most is its diversity,” the
41-year-old member of the NT
Philosophy faculty said.
Gunter spotlighted several natural
phenomena and the presence of rare
plants and animals in the area. Alligator
Grass Lake, for example, has a false bot-
tom and several floating islands which
drift with the wind, and yes, several al-
ligators drifting with the currents.
Jack Gore Baygall, located in the
Neches Bottom unit was named after a
man who refused to fight in the Civil
War and fled with his family to the Big
Thicket. Many storytellers swear the
family’s ghosts still haunt the area,
Gunter said.
“I WOULD suggest taking a camera
down there. The last 1 heard. National
Geographic will pay $6,000 for a picture
of an ivory-billed woodpecker.” This
particular species of woodpecker is con-
sidered the rarest bird in North
America, he said.
Gunter became involved in the con-
servation of the area in 1961, while he
was a graduate student at Yale Univer-
sity in Connecticut. “I was reading a
book called “I’ll Take Texas” by Mary
Lasswell, which had a chapter in it about
the Big Thicket,” he said. “1 carried it
around the Yale campus in a brown
paper wrapper for weeks and finally got
enough nerve to write a letter to (then
U.S. Senator) Ralph Yarborough."
Eventually, Yarborough set aside
about 1,000 acres as a nature preserve in
the Sam Houston National Forest, an
encouragement for Gunter to increase
his efforts.
In 1968, he began writing articles and
speaking publicly in support of conserv-
ing the ecological balance of the Big
Thicket.
“It was like a ‘snowball in the snow’
effect. I started doing more and more;
and the more I did, the more I wanted to
do," he said.
After more than a decade of con-
centrated work by area conservationists,
the Big Thicket was declared a national
park in 1974. Today, about three-
fourths of the land has been purchased
by the government.
THE BIG THICKET Association, of
which Gunter is former president, is
working to establish a 3,000-5,000 acre
state park for recreational purposes to
be located by the national preserve. This
would not involve any legislative action,
since funds for the purchase of the park
would come from the Texas Parks and
Wildlife Commission.
A lot of people do not know that a
penny on each pack of cigarettes goes
toward buying state park lands,” he
said. “So funding is not the basic
problem.”
GUNTER IS chairman of the
legislative committee of the Big Thicket
Association. Describing his job, Gunter
said, "Basically, I decide what strings to
pull, who to push and who to pull and
when to smile and when to scream.”
He described the fight against housing
developments and timber companies
and his dealings with the heads of these
businesses, state and federal legislators,
and the public as "a mixture of brass
knuckles and hearts and llowers.”
"The Big Thicket is many things to
many people. By involving it in politics,
we have had to make it all things to all
people," he said.
Long-range Association plans for the
area include getting corporations and
private land owners to donate lands to
the preserve. Two years ago. Time Inc.
gave a nature preserve, the Larson Sanc-
tuary, to the state, which made it a unit
of the Big Thicket.
“I will say one thing for the new
governor, at least he is studying the is-
sue," Gunter said. “We will get to him
yet.”
Program explains energy crisis
Instructor demonstrates methods of power production
By TZU-WEN FU
Daily Reporter
"Energy Today and Tomorrow," an
NT program to advise Texas high school
students how to conserve energy, is
presented to about 128 high schools in
the Daiias, Fort Worth and Houston
areas each year. Dr. Jerome L. Duggan
of the physics faculty said.
“NT's ‘Energy Today and Tomorrow’
program is a special live educational
program to explain the energy situation
to the high school students and en-
courage the students to do what they can
to understand the energy problem and to
conserve energy," Dr. Duggan said.
A teacher-demonstrator, Richard
Rawlins, a former NT student, visits the
high schools and presents the energy
program. He was trained for the project
at the Oak Ridge Associated Univer-
sities, an energy research organization
made up of 45 southern colleges and un-
iversities.
"The teacher-demonstrator presents
an easily understood program that ex-
plains the long-range and short-range
energy goals of the United States and the
ways energy is produced by normal
power plants, as well as by nuclear
power plants. He also looks at the long-
range goals of the fusion energy and
solar energy programs.
"Also, the teacher-demonstrator has a
very strong message that he delivers to
the students in regard to the conserva-
tion of energy," Dr. Duggan said.
Dr. Duggan said the program has two
types of presentations: an assembly
program for large groups and a class-
room program for smaller groups,
which is more like a lecture for science,
physics, chemist ry, biology and
humanities classes.
The assembly lasts from 35 to 50
minutes, depending on the time
available. Rawlins uses $25,000 worth of
equipment for demonstration during the
program
Dr. Duggan said the presentation
starts with an exposition on stage to
show how people can burn the energy it
took nature 10 million years to make in
10 seconds.
Two students will usually be invited
on stage and asked to pedal a bicycle
equipped with an electric generator to
produce electricity for a television set, a
radio, a light bulb and a fan.
The teacher-demonstrator uses other
equipment to explain differences and
similarities among methods of power
production and to explain how world
economics affect energy production. A
generator is used to show how smoke
particles may be captured from the
waste of a fossil fuel power plant.
In classrooms, the teacher-
demonstrator will answer questions
about the show and give more talks and
demonstrations.
“The teacher-demonstrator also gives
a small formal lecture on solar power,
geothermal or earthly heated power,
nuclear power and nine other topics,”
Dr. Duggan said.
Dr. Duggan said the program is
designed to explain to students what the
energy problem is. “It is not a short-
term problem but long-term. It is not go-
ing to go away, but will be with us from
now on."
Dr. Duggan said the NT “Energy To-
day and Tomorrow" program began in
1976. The program is funded by four
Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston utility
companies.
Dr. Duggan said the national
program is now operating in 44 states
and reaches nearly a million high school
students each year.
March 7. 1979
*«»• -lev
WHERE DID THE BUTTONS GO?—Although the crosswalk buttons
have been removed from the Avenue C crosswalk between Chiitnn Hall
and the Music Buildlna. students still cross in the old spot.
The Professor Graham
appreciation award is
given to a faculty member
on awards day for:
1) Expressed an outstanding interest in students
and teaching.
2) Involvement in the Community
3) Publications professional activities.
Nominations are now being accepted by the
SA, from 1-5 p.m. M-F, fourth floor of the
Union Building.
Deadline will be March 9.
—
nemezvous
PUZZLE
You have 12 steel balls, identical in size
and shape. One of the twelve is either
heavier or lighter than aii the rest. You also
have a set of old style justice scales which
you may use only 3 times, to weigh various
combinations of the balls. Can you derive a
solution that will not only identify the uni-
que ball, but also determine whether it is
heavier or lighter? To find the solution, talk
to the Navy information team in front of
the University Bookstore.
. . it is a lusty wench!"
DON’T MISS THE CLASSIC BATTLE OF THE
SEXES
in William Shakespeare’s
Hilarious Comedy
THE TAMING OF THE
SHREW
March 6-9 • 8:00 p.m.
University Theatre e Students $1.50
Texans may buy
gasohol this year
Texas motorists will be able to buy
gasohol fuel by the end of the year, state
Agriculture Commissioner Reagan
Brown said in a telephone interview
recently.
Unless a probiem arises, a torn
sweetener plant in Dimmitt and several
sugar cane processors in the Rio Grande
valley will be producing gasohol for
farm fuel.
Steps would be taken in an attempt to
exempt gasohol from motor fuel taxes,
remove bureaucratic barriers to the
production of gasohol and encourage in-
vestment in gasohol refineries, he said.
“We have high hopes that this type of
fuel will take some of the burdens off the
public in regard to the possible shortage
of gasoline.” Brown said.
He said gasohol from Midwest corn
crops is already being used by motorists
in Nebraska. Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota,
Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana and
Virginia.
Gasohol, which is 90 percent unleaded
gasoline and I0 percent 200 proof
anhydrous ethyl alcohol, may improve
mileage an average of five percent and
reduce carbon monoxide emissions up to
30 percent.
"Gasohol can be burned in internal
combustion engines without carburetor
modification," he said. It increases the
octane rating by three to four points.
The cost of easohol would be slightly
higher than that of premium grade gas-
oline, he said. "There would be a cost in-
crease of about 2 to 4 cents, but
some motorists prefer gasohol because
of the better mileage and engine perfor-
mance," he said.
The nation’s potential for meeting an
energy shortage and not being over
taken by it has been increased by the
availability of 60 million acres of non-
productive farm land that could be used
in growing corn, sorghum and other
starch or sugar crops capable of conver-
sion to fuel.
"As far as we can see now, Texas oil
companies aren't resisting the gasohol
idea. The new fuel source would be
welcomed as a replacement for imported
oil, I think,” Brown said.
1
iiiiimii
HHWIfffl
1
DAILY TIMES
MATINEE
SAT-SUN
1
3RD BIG WEEKI
RICHARD PRYOR
rated R
Fine Arts Times: Daily 5:30, 7:00, 8:30,10:00
Matinee 2:30, 4:00
SPECIAL BARGAIN DAILY 5:30-6:30
Restaurant and Club
Ramada Inn-Lewisville I35E at F.M. 121
featuring
Denton's Own Dynamic Duo
now and penny
Wednesday thru Saturday 7-11 p.m.
• Attitude Adjustment Hour
5-7 p.m. Mon-8at 12p.m.-1a.m. 8et
• Ladies' Nite—Thursday
• Amateur Nite—Tuesday
1/3 off Membership with Current Student 1.0.
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Morrison, Sue. The North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 62, No. 82, Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 7, 1979, newspaper, March 7, 1979; Denton, TX. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1002767/m1/4/?q=technical+manual: accessed July 1, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.