) |
The Post
es
EDITORIAL
Sunday, October 5, 2003
@UR OPINION
Give offending
“students a taste of
real life to learn from
‘A great deal of ink has been put on paper to publicize, spec-
ulate about and comment on the so-called hazing incident in
which a Lake-Lehman football player was injured. In the last
two weeks, observations and calls for a response have varied
from, “It’s no big deal; get over it,” to “String ‘em up,” as par-
ents, school officials and officers of the law have struggled to
find an appropriate reaction.
Clearly, significant punishment is in order for the four boys
who taped a younger teammate to a chair, smeared a chemical
compound on his face and — however inadvertently — were
responsible for breaking his jaw when the chair pitched for-
ward as it was being rolled from the locker room into the high
school gym. The apparent purpose was to humiliate the player
after a poor performance on the field in a junior varsity game.
ile some have labeled this a “hazing” incident, it clearly is
Wt that, but more a case of dangerous youthful horseplay that
got out of hand. Still, the “boys will be boys” approach just is-
n’t a strong enough reaction to behavior that caused a serious
injury.
' Their guilt was compounded when they ran away after their
teammate was injured, obviously more concerned with saving
their own skins than with his health and safety.
~ Given that scenario, and that many team members watched
the incident unfold and did nothing to stop it, Lake-Lehman
probably made a mistake in playing a game the following
weekend. Cancelling the season would have been an unfair
overreaction, but forfeiting a game would have sent a message
more in keeping with the gravity of the incident.
On the whole, it is best if the school and their families can
arrive at fitting punishment for the damage done. That should
include a heavy dose of counseling and community service for
everyone involved either actively or as a coldhearted by-
stander. It is not enough simply to respond to the obvious in-
juries; these young people need to have their eyes opened to
the real-life hardships many people deal with while they act
out their childish pranks. The four main characters need a
stronger lesson; several weeks of one-on-one assistance to
physical therapy patients or a long stint serving food at a soup
kitchen come to mind as possibilities.
There is a chance that criminal charges may be filed, but it’s
ard to see what result that approach would bring that a seri-
s schedule of counseling couldn’t achieve. Nor does it make
sense to force the students out of the district, and thereby let
them escape the opprobrium of classmates who are dismayed
® 0
by the negative spotlight their foolishness has cast on Lake-
Lehman and by the plain stupidity of their behavior.
- As for football, it should be off limits for the rest of the sea-
son for the players directly involved.
Whatever punishment is decided upon, it won't satisfy
everyone. Let’s just hope the final result is young people with a
Brave reminder of the Back Mountain's agricultural past. Photo by Ron Bartizek.
Oratory contest offers scholarships
High school age students of
the Back Mountain are invited
¢learer understanding of their responsibifitiesto themselves; “5 compete The 85th annual
one another and the wider community, and an appreciation for
the relative unimportance of a game compared to the chal- imac, contest. William Kupstas,
lenges of real life.
EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK
You'll notice some changes in The Post this week, and we
| jope you like them. The most obvious is the title, which is
ow simply “The Post.” The reasoning behind this is simple
+— over the years many people have remarked that the title led
them to think we were only about Dallas, not the entire Back
Mountain region. There has also been a tendency for Lake-
Lehman folks to feel we favor Dallas school coverage, which
we try very hard to address by making every
effort to give each district a comparable
amount of space. But the suspicion lingers
on, and this may help alleviate it.
The other obvious change is really an ad-
dition, a “Church & Community” page. The
Back Mountain is home to many active con-
gregations and it seems they are becoming
larger and stronger with each passing year.
Previously, we mixed church and social
news together, Now it seems to make sense to separate them.
But that’s not all we’re doing; we are adding a weekly pastor’s
column that we hope will rotate among every religious leader
in the region, and a listing of upcoming activities at our
churches. If you don’t see your church represented, mention to
your pastor that it should be. The deadline to receive items for
this page is noon on Wednesdays.
{By the way, if you are looking for the classified ads, they are
now included with all the others in the main classified pages of
the Sunday Times Leader.
Wed like to hear what you think about our renovation proj-
ct, so don’t hesitate to drop an e-mail to rbartizek@leader.net
or call me at 970-7157.
RON
BARTIZEK
| Letters invited
| Letters to the editor are welcome and will be published, sub-
' ject to guidelines regarding relevance and suitability.
. Letters must be signed and include the writer's home town
| and a telephone number for verification.
| Names will be withheld only if there exists a clear threat to
| the writer.
Send letters to: The Post, 15 N. Main St., Wilkes-Barre PA
18711.
= Tux POST
TIMESeLEADER Coggunity Newspaper Group
15 N. MAIN ST., WILKES-B E PA 18711 « 570-675-5211
dallaspost@leader.net
Ronald Bartizek
Patrick McHugh
EDITOR
PUBLISHER
Justin Wihogky
ADVERTISING ACCT. EXEC.
Greg Stauffer
AD PRODUCTION MANAGER
Erin Youngman
REPORTER
National High School Oratori-
Commander of the Daddow-
Isaacs Post 672 American Le-
gion, Dallas, said more than
$132,000 in college scholar-
ships will be awarded to win-
ners.
Local school officials and fac-
ulty are working with the Le-
gion and will assist with con-
test arrangements. Home-
schooled students are also wel-
come to enter.
The subject in the Prepared
Oration portion of the contest
must be about some aspect of
the Constitution of the United
States, emphasizing the duties
and obligations of a citizen to
the United States government.
The prepared oration must be
the original effort of the con-
testant and must be 8-10 min-
utes in length.
In addition to awards to win-
ners of various elimination
rounds of competition, scholar-
ships of $18,000, $16,000 and
$14,000 will be given to the
first through third places in the
national finals. Each state win-
ner who competes in the first
round of the national contest
will receive a $1,500 scholar-
ship. Participants in the second
round who do not advance to
the national final round will re-
ceive an additional $1,500
scholarship.
The top three youth orators
who have won all previous
elimination rounds of the con-
test will vie for top honors in_
the national contest on April 3-
4, 2004 at the IUPUI Confer-
ence Center and Hotel, Indi-
anapolis, Indiana.
The American Legion will
pay the expenses of state win-
ners at the national contest.
High school students in the
Back Mountain who are inter-
ested in entering the contest
will find the complete rules and
contest information at the
schools, or contact Clarence J.
Michael at 675-0488.
New books
at library
The Back Mountain Memori-
al Library, 96 Huntsville Road,
Dallas, announces the addition
of the following books to their
collection:
FICTION
“No Graves as Yet” by Anne
Perry
“Cold Ridge” by Carla Neg-
gers
“When the Emperor Was Di-
. vine” by Julie Otsuka
“How to Meet Cute Boys” by
Deanna Kizis
“The Present” by Spencer
Johnson
“Moon Tide” by
Clifton Tripp ;
“The Maid of the White
Hands” by Rosalind Miles
NON-FICTION
“The Woman's Day Weight-
Loss Plan” by Kathy Keenan
Isoldi
“The Healthy Table” by Luiz
Ratto
“Macromedia Dreamweaver
MX” by Sherry Bishop
“Creating Web Pages with
HTML and XML” by Patrick
Carey
“Novels, 1944-1953” by Saul
Bellow ;
BIOGRAPHY
“A Prison Diary” by. Jeffrey
Archer
LARGE PRINT FICTION
“Miss Julia Speaks Her
Mind” by Ann B Ross
REFERENCE
“A Guide Book of United
States Coins 2004” by R.S. Yeo-
man
“Books In Print 2003-2004”
“Subject Books in Print 2003-
2004”
BOOKS ON CD
“The Kingmaker” by Brian
Haig
“Genesis Force” by
Dawn
John
- Vornholt
“Horatio’s Drive” Dayton
Duncan and Ken Burns
YOUNG ADULT
“An American Plague: the
true and terrifying story of the
yellow fever epidemic” by Jim
Murphy
“High Heat” by Carl Deuker
Back Mountain
Senior Citizens
The Back Mountain Seniors
wish to announce change in
meeting dates.
Meetings will now be held
once monthly, on the first
Thursday of the month.
meetings wills start at 1 p.m.
and will be held in St. There-
ses’ Hall on Pioneer Ave. and
Davis Street in Shavertown.
We will start to work on
sleeping bags for the homeless
at 12 p.m. before each meeting.
For information call Lil at
696-1828 or Marie at 696-3095.
70 Years Ago
BOY SCOUTS WIN AT
KINGSTON RALLY
Boy Scouts from the Dallas
Districts, including troops from
Jackson, Dallas, Shavertown,
Trucksville and Idetown attend-
ed the West
Side dis
trict meet-
ing
Wednesday
night in
Kingston.
In competi-
tion with
troops from Kingston, Forty
Fort and all other communities
on the West Side of the river,
the local troops made a good
showing in all events.
“Prosperity,” the picture that
many local fans have been wait-
ing to see, is to be shown at the
Himmler Theatre tonight and
Saturday.
Some items you could get at
the A&P grocery: Tomato soup,
four cans for 25 cents, soda
crackers, 2 pound pkg, 25
cents. Rice Pops cereal, two
pkgs 15 cents.
ONLY
YESTERDAY
60 Years Ago
PACKS OF DOGS KILL
WILD GAME
State Game Protector T.A.
Reynolds has issued a warning
that large numbers of licensed
and unlicensed dogs are run-
ning wild game throughout the
Back Mountain Region. Many
of these dogs run in packs hunt-
ing rabbits and deer through-
out the night until their quarry
falls exhausted, an easy prey..
Two members of the Dallas
War Price and Rationing Board,
comprising the Gasoline Ra-
tioning panel, submitted their
resignations yesterday to Fred
Kiefer, chairman of the board.
They are H. Austin Snyder and
Howard W. Risley.
50 Years Ago
KUNKLE FIREMEN
REVIVE INFANT
Jason Kunkle and Fred Dod-
son saw a ten weeks infant re-
lieved from suffocation Monday
night when they applied the re-
suscitator mask and started op-
erations.
State and local police ask co-
operation in tracing the hit-run
driver who seriously injured
six-year old Guy Zerfoss Friday
night and sped off through
Shavertown, leaving the child
unconscious.
Dallas Water Company will
- shortly install a six-inch line to
New Goss Manor making it
possible for the installation of
fire hydrants in that area.
-40 Years Ago
MIGRANT SCHOOL
NOW AT ORANGE
School for children of mi-
grant workers employed in the
harvest of crops in the orange-
centermoreland-Falls area is
being conducted at the Orange
Methodist Church, and will
continue for five to six weeks.
A boy (Eric Martin) playing a
game of war with his compan-
ions, supposedly escaped from
“his enemy, jumped on his bicy-
cle and wheeled down Hillside
Street, when his bike was
struck by a car driven by Rew.
William Meissner. The boy was
saved from serious injury.
Rightly concerned over the
safety of school children cross-
ing the dangerous Center
Street intersection in Shaver-
town, Dallas School Board will
contact state representatives in
an effort to aid Kingston Town-
ship supervisors make the
crossroads safe.
30 Years Ago
PILOT PROJECT PUTS
CITIZENS FACE TO FACE
WITH INMATES
Channel 44 staffers, both
men and women, as citizens,
are exposed for the first time to
prison inmates. What citizens
see are people attempting to
demonstrate their concern for
their fellow man.
Public radio is coming to
North Eastern Pennsylvania
and volunteers can be a part of
the WVIA-FM team.
The Singer Company’s Cli-
mate Control Division has an-
nounced plans of closing its
manufacturing facility in
Trucksville.
20 Years Ago
TOWNHOUSES PLANNED,
BOARD CONSIDERS
Plans call for a new housing
development consisting of 16
townhouses to be built in the
area abounded by Church
Street, Center Hill Road and
Claude Street, an area known
as the Samuels property.
Entering into the ratings war
against “Winds of War” was
Dallas Township Police Chief
Carl Miers, who was a sunday
night guest on radio station
WARM. Miers discussed new
drunken driving laws with rep-
resentatives of MADD (Moth-
ers Against Drunk Driving).
State grant pays for a tele-
scope at Lake-Lehman. Kathryn
Gregory, science teacher in the
district, recently captured a
$3,500 grant from the State De-
partment of Education.
Q: Where do you find the most Back Mountain news each week?
A: Only in The Post