By Mary Neal Schutz, Information Director, NET
Editor's Note: In Search of the Oregon Trail, an epic
documentary produced by the Nebraska ETV Network and Oregon Public
Broadcasting, makes its national debut on public television stations
around the country with a special three-hour showing on April 29.
Narrated by actor Stacy Keach, the program airs at 7 p.m. April 29 and at
noon on May 5 on the Nebraska ETV Network.
The need to investigate -- and tell -- the rest of the story about the Oregon Trail has been with producer Michael Farrell for a long time. It may have had its first stirrings during one of those Saturday afternoons he spent as a child at the neighborhood movie house watching John Wayne westerns. Farrell, like millions of other kids, grew up with Hollywood's version of the "heroes" and the "villains" of America's western history.
Early on he began to question that simplistic view.
"Many of us had our first history lessons through the movies, where the emigrants who went West were represented as intrepid pioneers who were looking to conquer a new land, and the Indians were often portrayed as villains, committing unprovoked violence against countless innocent white families," said Farrell. "The fact is that the movies -- and many of our history books -- were a mythic creation justifying the westward expansion. The real story is much more complex than anything I've ever seen in a movie or elementary school history book."
"Violence did occur, but not as often as the movies would have us believe," Farrell explains. "The more common occurrence is that Indians would come into a wagon camp to trade or ask to be paid for the use of their grazing areas. And many times the encounters were tense. But in the vast majority of cases the outcomes were positive."
Among the historians who comprised the advisory committee for In Search of the Oregon Trail were two Native American scholars. "It was an interesting exercise to discuss the period of our history with the people whose ancestors were often assigned the role of the 'bad guys,'" explained Farrell. "They would frequently challenge our interpretations of this history, and after several challenges, it began to sink in that much of what we took for granted was subject to a completely different interpretation from their point of view.
"For example, we were taught the conflicting notion that it was somehow OK for white people to claim (and protect) land, but not OK for the Indian people to do the same."
In Search of the Oregon Trail is an effort to challenge the myths about this period of America's history, to tell the story more completely, including the Native American point of view, and to focus on the reality of the Westward migration as it was lived by the emigrants.
The movies have pounded into our subconscious, for example, the myth that the "wagon trains" were many times 20 or 30 wagons long. In fact the were usually only two or three wagons in length. "A few of the long trains did exist," says Farrell, "but only in the very early stages of the early migration."
In the early 1840s, people were encouraged to travel in large groups for protection, but soon disputes over leadership or arguments about things like whether or not to travel on Sundays broke up the trains. The norm was two or three wagons, belonging to a few families or an extended family traveling together.
The reality was that there was little need for protection of the large numbers. Of the 350,000 to 500,000 people who traveled along the Oregon Trail, relatively few experienced violent encounters with the Indians. What they did experience, however, was boredom, drudgery, sickness, fatigue and lots of plain, hard work.
To show viewers the reality of the day-in, day-out tedium of life on the Oregon Trail, In Search of the Oregon Trail makes use of historical re-enactments. "I didn't want to focus on the people as individual characters," said Farrell, "but rather give an impression of what it might have been like to live out in the elements, get up early to cook breakfast and prepare the oxen for traveling, then walk 15 to 20 miles, stop and fix broken wheels, etc., find water and grass, deal with illness and death...and then do it all over again the next day, for a period of six months."
The writings of those who experienced Oregon Trail life indicate that each family member had his or her duties and responsibilities. The men, most of whom were farmers, kept the wagons in repair, worked with the oxen and scouted for water and good grazing land. As the migration increased in numbers, game animals moved well away from the trail. That the men, most of whom weren't experienced hunters, carried guns, resulted in a significant number of accidental injuries and deaths. Women, although they receive little credit in history books, were actually the linchpins of the trail society. Their normal duties -- childcare, cooking, homemaking, etc. -- were complicated by the awkwardness of living on the trail, caring for the sick and injured and the necessity of traveling every day. That many became pregnant or gave birth on the trail as well may seem shocking to us today, but was an accepted fact of the 19th century migration.
Once the emigrants arrived in Oregon, their task became finding and building a home, making a living and existing in a culture very different from the one they had left behind -- a new set of rules, needs, politics, hostilities and dangers. The U.S. government had only recently acquired this land from the British and had not yet made treaties with the Indians who considered it theirs. Several decades of conflict ensued. Then, as the nation became embroiled in the Civil War, Oregon became only a remote outpost, far removed from the mainstream of American society.
Life was difficult and the settlers came to feel the need to remember
and memorialize their experiences on the Oregon Trail. In the late
decades of the 19th century, they formed the Oregon Pioneer Association
in an effort to preserve the memories. Those stories and memories,
magnified through time, formed the basis of the many myths that have been
inherited about this chapter in America's history.
By Kim Hachiya, News & Information
Affirmative action has been called society's poison and society's salvation. The topic is white-hot controversial nationally. And a panel discussion at UNL April 24 provided some sparks.
Law professors Rick Duncan and Anna Shavers, sociology professor Miguel Carranza, and student affairs vice chancellor James Griesen offered their views. Duncan spoke against affirmative action while the others defended. And predictably, it was Duncan's remarks that sparked the most reaction from the 40 or so in the audience.
Courts are scrapping affirmative action policies, especially those that use race as a decisive factor, Duncan said. While he did not dispute that past imbalances and injustices have occurred, he argued there are other ways to make decisions without using race as a factor.
Economic status, opinions, life experiences and geography all could be factors used in determining admissions to colleges or in hiring decisions, he said.
But Shavers said race does matter. She was reared in Little Rock, Ark., and she lived through "colored only" drinking fountains and overt "back of the bus" attitudes. The experiences of a black woman in those circumstances has affected her entire life, she said.
"Affirmative action is something most people would like to not have," she said. "But unfortunately we are not at a point where we no longer need it. I have benefited from affirmative action, just as I have been discriminated against due to the color of my skin."
Carranza said a common misception is that affirmative action programs simply hand out degrees or jobs to people without reference to merit. Instead, he said, affirmative action is the opportunity to achieve a degree, win tenure or merit a promotion by giving people the chance to demonstrate their abilities because they have been placed into a position to achieve.
Carranza said it is a myth that the playing field is level for all. Affirmative action, he said, creates access to the field.
Griesen argued that a state-supported institution like UNL is obligated to educate all the citizens. He said allowing a "plus factor," such as race or ethnicity to be factored into admissions or hiring decisions is a way to balance past injustices.
Duncan argued that it's unfair to make people pay today for the sins of the past. Shavers and several audience members indicated those sins are not past.
Duncan also said affirmative action policies stigmatize minorities by casting in doubt their abilities. And, he said, the policies breed, not stifle, racist behaviors. When 70 white males are passed over for a promotion to tap a black male 71st in line, Duncan said, the resentment and anger will manifest in racist behavior.
"That's a social poison I think is dangerous," he said.
The discussion was sponsored by Faculty and Staff for Cultural
Diversity in cooperation with the chancellor's commissions on the status
of women and the status of people of color and the Office of Graduate
Studies.
By Robert Sheldon, News & Information
The lingering belief that tax cuts stimulate production and are crucial to eliminating the federal deficit is challenged by Wallace Peterson, George Holmes Professor of Economics emeritus at UNL, in an article appearing in the April issue of The Washington Monthly.
Peterson derives his conclusions from an analysis of economic productivity during three periods dating back to the "Roaring 20s."
"More often than not," Peterson writes in his article, "tax rates and growth rates move in the same direction -- in other words, higher taxes accompany higher growth, and vice versa."
The most recent period for testing the idea that lower taxes stimulate growth was during the Reagan years, when people in top brackets saw their rates decline 29 percent. Reagan's promise that increased output because of tax cuts would bring in more tax revenue and balance the budget turned out to be a false one, Peterson said in his article, "Why Higher Taxes (on the Wealthy) Won't Slow Growth."
"In Reagan's first six years in office the economy grew only moderately," Peterson said, "despite massive priming of the pump through defense expenditures and tax cuts."
Peterson said that history provides 69 out of the last 81 years (eliminating both world war periods and the transition periods immediately following) for testing supply-side theory. "In 55 of those years -- 80 percent of the time -- higher top bracket marginal tax rates are associated with higher growth rates -- not lower ones."
Peterson also argues that the history of changes in capital gains taxes is even more unfavorable to supply-side theory.
"It is nearly impossible to devise a capital gains tax break that truly rewards enterprise, as opposed to mere speculation," Peterson said.
He said that although Steve Forbes and his flat-tax candidacy have been driven out of the current presidential race, the idea of a flat tax will "almost certainly affect the tenor of the debate between President Clinton and Bob Dole in the fall."
"Forbes' tax scheme," Peterson said, "is really just new packaging for an old Republican idea: large tax cuts are heralded as a panacea to all the economy's ills."
He said that Ronald Reagan promised in 1981 that massive tax cuts
would eliminate the federal deficit by 1984 and yield a surplus of $29.2
billion two years later. "Instead, by 1984, the deficit had reached $85.4
billion. By 1988, the federal debt had swollen to $2.6 trillion."
Grocery shoppers of the last generation have witnessed the virtual disappearance of the mom-and-pop corner grocery stores and are watching as larger stores take over larger shares of the market.
According to three members of the UNL Marketing Department, significant changes will continue to take place in the nation's grocery industry, and those changes could have an impact on Nebraska consumers and retail grocers.
Writing in the April issue of Business in Nebraska, Ray Marquardt, professor and director of the agribusiness program, assistant professor Wanru Su and doctoral candidate Tim Burkink address how the grocery industry is becoming more concentrated and how the relationships among manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers are evolving.
Marquardt, Su and Burkink show that the share of U.S. retail grocery sales held by conventional stores fell from 73 percent in 1980 to 30 percent in 1991 as fewer and larger stores have come to dominate the market. The number of grocery stores in Nebraska declined by 11 percent to 1,095 from 1982 to 1992, while the sales per store increased by 70 percent to nearly $2 million. From 1983-93, average store size nationwide increased 38 percent to 37,202 square feet.
"As the grocery industry becomes more concentrated, power is shifting from manufacturers to retailers and wholesalers, giving the latter two more control over pricing promotion and merchandising decisions," they write. Manufacturers have responded by limiting trade promotions and opting for everyday low pricing as a means of stabilizing consumer demand. This has caused wholesalers to streamline their distribution by promoting high-volume purchases by retailers and making fewer low-volume deliveries to small stores.
"The impact of these changes on Nebraska is likely to be significant,
since the majority of grocers in the state are supplied by grocery
wholesalers," they write. "Grocery retailers in Nebraska, particularly
those in rural areas, will face increasing competitive pressures as their
suppliers strive to optimize efficiency. However, grocery retailers have
a long history of efficiency and responsiveness to consumers. This
favorable history . . . indicates that small grocers likely will continue
to find ways to effectively compete in their markets."
The wide strips of grass and trees at several UNL test sites are more than just part of the scenery. While they sway in the breeze, they also trap sediment, nutrients and pesticides, and are proving to be a valuable tool in preventing nonpoint source pollution.
According to Kyle Hoagland, aquatic ecologist at UNL, nonpoint source runoff of fertilizers, pesticides and sediment from agricultural fields is the primary cause of declining surface water quality nationwide. Riparian buffer strips, or streamside vegetation, can reduce the amount of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus and of pesticides entering a stream.
During the 1996 growing season, groups of producers, landowners and interested professionals will be able to tour three buffer strip research and demonstration projects at the NU Agricultural Research and Development Center near Ithaca. The projects were set up by Jim Brandle, shelter belt ecologist; Tim Schmitt, a forestry, fisheries and Wildlife graduate student; Mike Dosskey and Michele Schoeneberger of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service-National Agroforestry Center in Lincoln; and Tom Franti, UNL biological systems engineer.
The projects consist of a large-scale setup, a small-scale setup and a third to obtain watershed measurements. Practical recommendations and data about the efficiency of buffer strips here in Nebraska are needed, the researchers said.
"Relatively little is known about the potential of buffer strips in the Midwest," Hoagland said. Recommendations call for a width of 95 feet, but they are not based on research in the Midwest.
"These figures may be unrealistic and perhaps not necessary here," Hoagland said. "Since nonpoint source pollution is considered to be the worst in the Midwest, it is important to conduct research on buffer strips here."
Brandle, who manages the section of land on which the research takes place for the UNL Department of Forestry, Fisheries and Wildlife, said the project takes into account the entire agricultural production system.
"We're really interested in how all of the factors affect the ag system," he said. "Factors include production, biodiversity and vegetation characteristics on buffer strips. We're also looking at how buffer strips can become more economically palatable to landowners. Timber, fruit and nut production of buffer strips are potential economic incentives."
In addition to protecting water quality, buffer strips also increase wildlife habitat and lessen flood damage.
The scientists installed several large buffer strips with different types of vegetation last year. The strips are 250 feet long and 50 feet wide and consist of grass; grass and shrubs; and grass, trees and shrubs. The strips are next to a stream that drains cropland to demonstrate what buffer strips look like and how they work. Eventually, the strips will be identified by signs.
Last year, researchers also installed 40 plots of small buffer strips. The plots have a variety of vegetative combinations, such as switchgrass; mixed grass, trees and shrubs; pasture; and conventional row crops. The plots are either 25 feet or 50 feet wide. Researchers demonstrate which design best filters and retains contaminants.
Researchers have completed one run of the experiment and are now
analyzing the samples. This demonstration project will continue for two
more years.
Brian Foster, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, will chair a 12-member committee charged with finding a new senior vice chancellor for academic affairs at UNL.
The position will be vacated in June when Joan Leitzel leaves UNL to become president of the University of New Hampshire.
The search committee was appointed by Chancellor James Moeser. Its task will include advertising, recruiting and soliciting nominations for the position; screening and interviewing applicants; and forwarding a list of names to Moeser for his consideration. The committee also, with the advisement of the chancellor, will develop a list of educational philosophies, management styles and other criteria that will help in "matching" the candidate with UNL's needs.
Foster said the committee will organize in the spring but due to summer schedules probably not fully function until fall, when the search will intensify.
"It's very important we get into the field early," he said. "Typically search committees are just getting organized in the fall, so we will be ahead of the game. The best searches occur when a strong pool of applicants is developed. We need to be proactive in getting good people to apply or encouraging good people to be allowed to be nominated."
Other members of the committee are: Paul Amato, professor of
sociology; Gene Crump, executive director of the Central Interstate
Low-Level Radioactive Waste Compact Commission; Malcolm Kass, UNL student
government; David Lou, professor and chair of mechanical engineering;
Judith Owen, president of Norwest Nebraska; Robert Middelstaedt,
professor of marketing; Sharon Quisenberry, professor and head of
entomology; Barbara Plake, professor of educational psychology and
director of the Buros Institute of Mental Measurements; Susan Rosowski,
professor of English; Anthony Starace, professor of physics; and James
Van Etten, professor of plant pathology.
The silver-tongued legacy of William Jennings Bryan, one of the greatest orators of all time, will be honored this weekend as top American college orators compete in Nebraska and celebrate the 100th anniversary of his "Cross of Gold" speech.
The oldest, most prestigious oratory tournament in the nation, the Interstate Oratorical Association Nationals will be hosted by UNL April 26-27. The semifinal rounds of the tournament will be April 27 at the Cornhusker Hotel in the Garrat Room with two rounds beginning at 8:30 a.m. and 10 a.m. The competition is free and open to the public.
Dennis Bormann, a UNL communications studies professor, will discuss Bryan's speech at a luncheon with contest participants April 27. The contest finals will be at the Lincoln home where Bryan lived, and students also will tour the home. Bryan, who was nominated for president three times, competed in the same contest in the 1890s.
The tournament will include persuasive speeches by 55 students, including Mike Wagner, a sophomore from Marshall, Minn., the only UNL student to qualify for the tournament.
The Interstate Oratorical Association Nationals will be judged by the following panel: Helen Moore, chairman of the UNL sociology department; Patrick Combs, U.S. Congressional candidate; Michael Scott, television anchorman; Frank LaMere, Native American rights advocate; and David Landis, Nebraska state senator.
Known as the Boy Orator of the Platte, Bryan, then 36, delivered his "Cross of Gold" speech at the Democratic National Convention July 8, 1896. "You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold," he thundered in defiance of economic policies he believed exploited farmers and laborers.
"He was considered one of the greatest orators of all time," Bormann said. Bryan was a powerful speaker with such an unusual ability to articulate and project his voice that he could be heard outdoors by 10,000 people without a microphone. "You could see his back molars when he was speaking," he said.
An exhibit that opened last month at the Museum of Nebraska History,
15th and P streets, honors Bryan, who initiated "whistle stop
campaigning" and promoted election of U.S. senators by the people, the
vote for women, bank deposit insurance and initiative and referendum.
by Tom Simons, News and Information
Three years after what is now EconomicsAmerica-Nebraska received a $750,000 National Science Foundation grant to establish the Nebraska Economics Fellows Institute for Secondary Teachers at UNL, 32 secondary school teachers are set to earn master's degrees in economics at UNL's May 4 commencement exercises.
"To have 32 of the original number of 35 graduate is a pretty high percentage of retention," said Roger Atwood, who succeeded the now-retired James Marlin as president of EconomicsAmerica-Nebraska last fall. "That speaks to an outstanding level of commitment from the teachers and to the faculty of the Economics Department at UNL."
Marlin conceived the Nebraska Economics Fellows program in 1993 "to train 35 of the best teachers in the state to be teacher-trainers in economics." The original 35 fellows were selected from a field of 77 applicants and weren't required to have any economics background. They attended intensive five-week summer sessions on campus in 1993, 1994 and 1995, in which they first studied economic theory and comparative economic systems, then learned how to teach other teachers the principals of economics, and finally learned how to incorporate the teaching of economics into other courses in the curriculum, from elementary to advanced placement courses.
Each fellow received a $1,500 stipend each summer of the institute. Room and board on the UNL campus, textbook expense and travel expenses for one round trip from home to Lincoln was provided each session, and tuition was not charged by UNL.
Marlin said the institute was the first of its kind in the United States. At least one teacher was selected from each of Nebraska's 19 Education Service Units, with the idea of those teachers being able to pass along their newly gained knowledge to other teachers in their areas.
The economics fellows grant was a companion project to a three-year, $1.8 million NSF grant EconomicsAmerica-Nebraska also received in 1993 to create an "Electronic Economics Tutor for Teachers" using CD-ROM technology. EconomicsAmerica-Nebraska is distributing one of 84,500 copies of the CD-ROM to nearly every school in the United States.
The fellows will be honored at a May 4 breakfast at the Wick Alumni
Center, prior to commencement exercises at the Bob Devaney Sports Center.
Early in 1995, the Business Services Advisory Council (BSAC) conducted a survey seeking input from the campus on how well the Business and Finance service units were meeting the needs of the university.
Below are responses from the remaining two service units listed on the
survey to the questions and concerns raised concerning those units. Those
with additional questions about a specific service unit are asked to
contact the person listed for that particular service area.
University Bookstore has recently implemented the following programs with the help of Support Services:
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