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COVERING THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA SINCE 1901 VOL. 95 NO. 149 Low in the mid 40's.
■ ■ - April 23, 1996
Beiiinger laid to rest in Kansas
Coaches talk
of strong faith,
good character
By Matthew Waite
Senior Editor
GOODLAND, Kan. — In the four years
Turner Gill coached Brook Berringer, he asked
him to do many things. At Berringer’s funeral
Monday, Gill made one more request — save
him a spot in Heaven.
“I love you brother,” Gill said, weeping. “I
will miss you until the time that we meet again.”
More than 1,900 people filled the Max L.
Jones Fieldhouse in this small western Kansas
town for the double funeral service for Berringer
andTobey Lake. Both died Thursday in a plane
crash near Lincoln.
Berringer and Lake, both licensed pilots, had
been out for a pleasure flight in a Piper Cub
when the small plane went down. Federal in
vestigators are now determining a cause of the
crash.
After the funeral, private airplanes from the
area flew the missing-man formation over the
cemetery. The formation, where four planes fly
in a row and one splits off from the group, is an
honor for downed pilots.
Berringer and Lake both grew up in this
northwest Kansas town of about 5,000. More
than half of the crowd at the fieldhouse trav
eled to the rural cemetery where Berringer and
Lake were buried.
During the three-hour service, the families
of both men held each other and wept. Through
sniffles, a few laughs could be heard when a
tribute video showed Berringer reading Dr.
Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham” to a group of
school children.
Speaker after speaker told of Berringer and
Lake’s good character, their love of life and love
of the outdoors.
Gill, the NU quarterbacks coach, read a let
ter he wrote to Berringer after his death. He
praised Berringer for his abilities and for his
character.
“Not only are you one of the most-talented
quarterbacks at Nebraska, you are the very defi
nition of a team player,” Gill said. “I am so proud
to have coached you. I am so proud to have
known you.”
More than 50 current and former players and
coaches from the Nebraska football team made
the trip to Goodland.
Coach Tom Osborne praised Berringer for
his character and his faith.
“This was a difficult assignment for me,”
Osborne said. “I loved Brook. I loved the type
of person he was.”
Osborne said when he and Berringer talked,
the topic often was fishing. “Sometimes foot
ball didn’t get as much attention as it should
have,” the coach said.
Osborne said Berringer was one of the best
people he had coached of the about 2,000 play
ers he has seen at Nebraska. Osborne — him
See FUNERAL on 3
Matt Miiler/DN
The family of Tobey Lake looks on during funeral services Monday for Lake and Brook Berringer in Goodland, Kan.
Goodland hushed as community mourns
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oy mannew wane
Senior Editor
GOODLAND, Kan.—For a Monday morn
ing, it is quiet here.
Only a few cars dot the streets of this north
west Kansas town of 5,000. The only people
outside are police officers setting up barricades
near the Max L. Jones Fieldhouse.
The breakfast crowd at Ray’s Restaurant near
Main Street isn’t talking. The regulars are quiet.
Chet Ross, a retired Air Force chaplain, walks
•into Ray’s around 8:30 a.m., tells the waitress
behind the counter “no doughnut today” and
sits down in one of the green booths.
He knows the waitress, and she knows his
order before he says it. She leaves, and Ross is
quiet.
The former chaplain led a candlelight vigil
Friday night on a football field.
Goodland lost two of its own Thursday.
Brook Berringer, the former NU quarterback,
and Tobey Lake, also a Goodland native, were
killed when the Piper Cub plane they were fly
ing crashed near Lincoln.
The community was shocked, Ross said.
“Community was very
important to both. ”
MIKE QUILLING
Goodland teacher
“They were two young athletes that were
very highly respected,” he said. “Grief is always
a shock.”
Grief leads to questions of why.
“That’s the question you can always ask but
never answer,” said Ross, who has lived in
Goodland for most of the last 50 years.
Berringer was a hero to many in Goodland,
Ross said, and Lake was a hard-working young
citizen.
“While one has received a little more fame
than the other, they were both tremendous young
men,” he said.
As Ross spoke, Bob Craven entered Ray’s
and sat down. Craven, who owned an excava
tion company before retirement, used to em
ploy Lake.
nc waa a inguiy ucpciiuauic pcisuu, a
ven said. “He had good morals. His social be
havior was extra perfect.”
Ross said Lake was a clean-cut kid.
“I never heard him use an incorrect, you’d
say bad, curse word,” Ross said, adding that
Lice’s feat was a “novelty these days.”
Even before people had begun to gather for
Monday’s funeral, Ross said he knew it was
going to be a big one. He said the fact that the
services were being held in the Max L. Jones
Fieldhouse showed the community’s respect and
affection for Berringer and Lake.
“Usually our churches are large enough for
our funerals,” he said.
Guiding traffic outside the fieldhouse before
the funeral, Mike Quilling, a reserve officer and
Goodland band teacher, said the size of the fu
neral didn’t surprise him..
“Community was very important to both,”
he said, directing a large white Cadillac into a
stall.
Berringer was a hometown hero, an inspira
tion to schoolchildren here, Quilling said.
See GOODLAND on 3
Students protest Playboy visit
By Tea Taylor
Senior Reporter
Overshadowed by a larger, happier
group of UNL students celebrating
Earth Day, only four students gathered
Monday near Broyhill Fountain to pro
test Playboy magazine’s two-day visit
to Lincoln.
Holding signs reading“Playboy Off
our Campus,” and “Playboy Not Wel
come On Our Campus” the small
group said the university’s acceptance
of the magazine’s presence was “frus
trating.”
“They are offering up students like
some sort of sacrificial lamb,” said
Nancy Berg, the protest’s organizer.
“It’s like, here — this is what you are
going to be valued on.”
Berg, a freshman secondary music
education major, said the magazine
sent a message to females that “ulti
mately, what’s more important is how
I look.”
Freshman art major Amy Wozny
said the fact that many UNL students
were looking forward to the October
issue was “unfortunate.”
“I just thought we were getting past
that whole exploitation of women
thing,” she said.
Wozny said also having UNL
women appear in Playboy could have
negative impacts down the line.
“That could lead to other things
happening on campus like date rape,”
she said.
Another area of concern for the pro
testers was the magazine’s advertise
ments, which have appeared in the
Daily Nebraskan.
Hans Yungc, a sophomore photog
raphy major, said he was disappointed
that the Daily Nebraskan ran the ad for
Playboy.
“But it’s not fair to protest the DN
entirely,” he said. “I’m a student here,
and I pay my tuition, and my bills and
I shouldn’t have to, all of a sudden,
open the DN and see that Playboy is
coming to campus.
See PLAYBOY on 8
Earth Day celebrates
continued improvements
By Cherie Krueger
Staff Reporter
Boca burgers, hemp products
and mountain bikes were abundant
on Broyhill Plaza on Monday as the
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
celebrated Earth Day.
Ecology Now and the Environ
mental Resource Center put to
gether a day filled with speakers,
booths and a lot of hope for the fu
ture of the planet.
Representatives of the various
organizations were pleased with the
student turnout, despite the chilly
weather. '
“It went very well,” said Carol
Klein, a volunteer with the Environ- *
mental Resource Center. “We al
ways hope for more, but with this
weather we can’t expect that much.”
See EARTH DAY on 6