The Charlotte News
Thursday, October 10, 1957
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page
reports that the spent rocket which had launched Sputnik into space
was observed this date by a New Haven, Conn., moonwatch team scanning
the predawn skies above New England, the first visual fix in the U.S.
of the satellite or its launch vehicle, though there had been
reported observations by individuals. The sighting was confirmed by
the Astrophysical Observatory of the Smithsonian Institution in
Cambridge, Mass. The head of the Observatory said that the
third-stage rocket which had been observed was larger than the
satellite, itself, and produced a much brighter reflection of light.
A representative of the moonwatch team at New Haven, who had been the
first to spot a flash of light in the northeastern sky as Sputnik and
the rocket made an orbit passing northeast of Boston, stated that the
rocket stage looked like a star moving across the heavens and that it
was not visible to the naked eye but only through a telescope. He had
then pointed it out to the head of the New Haven mooonwatch team, a
professor of science at New Haven State Teachers College. The first
visual sighting of the satellite had been reported from Sydney,
Australia, the previous day and photographs of it had been made at
New Brook, Alberta, Canada, the previous day, while at Stanford
University in Palo Alto, Calif., it had been tracked by radar. Thick
fog over the Northeast coast had prevented some observers this date
from seeing it as it passed over that area. Monitoring stations in
the Western Hemisphere and in Europe reported signals from the
satellite in strong, albeit varying tones. There was some difference
of opinion among scientists as to whether the satellite was
maintaining its rate of speed and altitude, but broadcasts from
Moscow said that the satellite would remain aloft for a long time.
Earlier, it was reported that a photograph had been taken of it at
Auckland, New Zealand. Dr. Fred Whipple, director of the
Astrophysical Observatory at Cambridge, said that no new information
had been received to define more closely the orbit of the satellite,
indicating his satisfaction that "all the visual observations to
date were on the final stage rocket, not the satellite, itself."
Russian and Western scientists had said that both the satellite and
the rocket which had launched it were orbiting the earth, and the
Russians indicated that the nosecone was also in orbit. The signals
coming from Sputnik were reported by listening posts in various
places to have changed from the original beeping sound. The U.S.
Naval Research Laboratory in Washington said that it was receiving a
hum interspersed with an occasional beep, and radio operators in
Mazatlan, Mexico, reported hearing a signal which sounded like "psst,
psst, psst"
During an interview in Moscow with James Reston of the New York Times, Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev made it clear that the Soviet Union was prepared to use military force if necessary to defend its interests in the Middle East. The Soviet leader also accused Secretary of State Dulles of inciting Turkey to start a war in the Middle East by attacking Syria, and challenged the U.S. Senate to investigate the charge. The interview, published this date, had taken place the prior Monday at Communist Party headquarters in Moscow and the final portion of it had been released by the Soviet Government for publication this date. Mr. Reston reported that Mr. Khrushchev had said: "If war breaks out, we are near Turkey and you are not. When the guns begin to fire, the rockets can begin flying and then it will be too late to think about it… Turkey would not last one day in case of war." Mr. Khrushchev charged that Mr. Dulles had first instructed Loy Henderson, Deputy Undersecretary of State, to incite Jordan and Iraq against Syria during the latter's trip to the Middle East, after leftist officers took control of Syria's armed forces the prior August.
The Eisenhower Administration this date ordered an end to fingerprinting for virtually all visitors to the U.S., with a few exceptions. (This change in policy was undoubtedly how they got here and then started breeding in their pods.)
In Accra, Ghana, the Foreign Ministry announced this date that it had accepted an apology from the U.S. for the Ghana finance minister having been prevented from dining the prior Monday at a Dover, Del., restaurant because of his color.
In Oslo, Norway, General Hans Speidel left Norway this date after an overnight visit without encountering demonstrators protesting his service under Hitler during the war. General Speidel, West Germany's top military officer, commanding NATO ground forces in central Europe, had flown from Rygge Air Force Base, 50 miles from Oslo, where he had landed the previous day to avoid a crowd waiting at the Oslo Airport to demonstrate against him. He was traveling with French General Jean Valluy, his NATO superior. The group had driven to the air base at such speed that they had left behind the press, but there had been no crowd at the Oslo Airport, where the generals had been scheduled to depart an hour later. General Speidel had been booed in Copenhagen, which Nazi forces had occupied during World War II. About 5,000 persons had demonstrated the previous day in Oslo against his visit and workers staged brief protest strikes throughout the country. The General's plans for this date were maintained in secret and most people appeared satisfied that the point had been made by the earlier demonstrations. The General had been jailed by the Nazis following the July 20, 1944 failed attempt to kill Hitler with a bomb placed beneath his desk while presiding over a meeting at the Fuhrer bunker. The General was teaching history when the West German Government called him back into uniform in 1950.
In Denver, the Civil Aeronautics Administration said that a "huge fireball" which had passed over the Denver area early this date had undoubtedly been a meteor.
For the first time since early September, the crisis in Little Rock did not make the front page. Nor was there anything about it on the editorial page. The fourth of the five-part series on Little Rock by Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Relman Morin, however, is on an inside page. He relates of the situation on "Black Monday", September 24, which had finally prompted the President to federalize the Arkansas National Guard and deploy the paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock. Late that night, former News editor and associate editor Harry Ashmore, executive editor of the Arkansas Gazette which had fought editorially Governor Orval Faubus, had been contacted by a high official of the Department of Justice, wanting to know what was occurring at that point in the city. Mr. Ashmore had responded, "I'll give it to you in a sentence: the police have been routed, the mob is in the streets, and we're close to a reign of terror." The next day, the President federalized the National Guard and deployed the paratroopers. As the Army troops entered the city that evening, the people stared in disbelief as nothing of the type had been seen in an American city since Reconstruction days 90 years earlier. Mr. Morin observes, "You had an overwhelming sense of history, of seeing a moment that Americans will remember for many years." He relates of the varying points of view which he found that night as he interviewed people in the city. Some believed the presence of the Army troops would bring peace while others found it to be "dictator stuff" and shameful. Quiet was quickly restored as the troops made it plain the next day that they meant business, prodding at rifle-point two groups of protesters across from the school to move down the block and disperse. After that, the trouble ceased and the nine black students were able to return safely to classes under escort by the Army troops and the Guardsmen, the same who had originally been deployed on September 3 by Governor Faubus to prevent the students from attending classes on the basis of preserving peace and order. An attempt by some 70 white students had been made to lead a protest at the school by walking out of classes, but it had failed to draw any more support from the student body of 2,000, after the school authorities had threatened suspension for anyone skipping classes. The prior weekend, 69 students, most of whom had participated in the boycott, and the remainder having engaged in attacking two of the male black students in the hallways, had been suspended. The superintendent of schools, Virgil Blossom, threatened more crackdowns should other incidents follow. The following day, in the last of the series, Mr. Morin would report on what would likely occur when the Federal troops were removed from Little Rock.
The editorial page is here. "The Platform Has Lost Some Thunder" reports of the death of John W. Hester of Pittsboro, who regularly wrote letters to The News and to other newspapers across the state. It describes him as having been "a craggy monolith of eloquent indignation", primarily aiming his "brimstone" at the subject of integration while maintaining that he had helped several black students through the years.
Mr. Hester was an attorney who was born in the 19th Century and his mindset readily reflected that background.
It finds that he had been a careful reader of the newspaper's editorial page and had "trumpeted his disagreement whenever he felt the editors were off base", which was often. It believes he genuinely enjoyed what he called the "battle of wits with the Ivory Tower" and almost confessed a certain satisfaction in the relationship in "salty personal notes" when he renewed his subscription.
"It will be a little quieter in the People's Platform and we are more than a little sad about it. Despite some harsh exchanges, what we have lost is a friend."
We highlight the editorial only because we found many, if not most, of Mr. Hester's letters to have been indicative only of his 19th Century background and not his diploma, at least in any modern sense, from UNC. He regularly inveighed against the current UNC administration for its liberal tendencies and openly vowed not to give any funding to the University for its stance in favor of integration.
Framed Edition
Links-Date — Links-Subj.