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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 20, 1997)
SPORTS USE Zero to one Sax with a twist October 20,j 1997 Nebraska’s defense posted a 29-0 shutout of Kadri Gopalnath perfoms theCamatic music of Texas Tech Saturday and vaulted to the No. 1 spot his native India with an accepted variation of the That’S Why THEY CALL It BLUES... in both The AP and USA Today polls. PAGE 10 ancient style —- the alto saxophone. PAGE 15 Cloudy and cool, high 53. Wi pnight, low 30. Sandy Summers/DN UNL HISTORY PROFESSOR BENJAMIN RADER holds the glove he used as a kid playing ball in southern Missouri. Rader’s “Baseball: America’s Game” has been called one of the greatest single volume histories of the game ever. By Ted Taylor Senior Reporter Double play Baseball author, UNL professor reflects on America’s pastime Baseball is our game. “(It) has the snap, go, fling of the American atmosphere - belongs as much to our institutions, fits into them as significantly, as our constitu tions, laws: is just as important in the sum total of our historic life.” Those are hie words of poet Walt Whitman. “Regardless of wars, economic catastrophes, natural disasters, or personal tragedies, the mem ories remain. In a world of seething changes, baseball continues to offer comfort and reassur ance; it remains America s Game.” These are the written words of Benjamin Rader. A James L. Sellars professor of American history and sport at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Rader , is also a baseball author and historian of sorts - a baseball historian who’s not exactly historic and anything but a purist. He is certain the Marie McGwires of today could hack it with the Mickey Mantles of old. He believes Hall of Fame pitcher Sandy Koufax had it easy compared to the shrinking strike zone and better athletes Greg Maddux faces today. And he never really thought twice about Lou Gehrig’s consecutive-games played streak being broken by Cal Ripken Jr. two years ago. He isn’t bothered by the game and the players today because he takes heart that they evolved from the game and players of yesterday. About the only problem he has with baseball right now (besides artificial turf) is the growing number of teams in the league. “It’s harder to keep up with the game mentally,” he said. “When I was a kid, there were azillion of us who could tell you everything about all the teams. That isn’t the case anymore.” Please see RADER on 2 Regents OK $1.7 million deficit request By Erin Gibson Senior Reporter Despite some dissent, the NU Board of Regents Friday approved the university’s budget deficit request of $1.7 million, which the Legislature will consider granting in its spring session. The request, approved during the Regents’ monthly meeting in Lincoln, consists of $1.4 million to cover the university’s tuition revenue shortfall, $197,000 to maintain 55 acres of land in Ak-Sar-Ben that was donated to the universi ty’s Omaha campus and $93,538 to pay opera tions and maintenance costs of new space in the Nebraska Union. The regents unanimously approved funding for the union, but Regent Drew Miller of Papillion said the university should cover the remaining budget request. “I think it’s a big mistake to go back to the governor and the Legislature and the taxpayers and ask for money,” Miller said. “Let’s do some belt-tightening here.” Miller voted against the tuition revenue aspect of the request and abstained from voting on requesting maintenance funds for the Ak Please see REGENTS on 6 Oldfield, Bryan inducted into Hall of Fame By Ted Taylor Senior Reporter The first American journalist to become a paratrooper leapt into the Nebraska Journalism Hall of Fame Friday, with two of the state’s most important historical figures on his wing. Living Nebraska journalism legend, Col. Barney Oldfield (USAF-ret.), along with Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Willa Cather and three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan were added to the exclusive list of 39 journalists already in the hall. And surprisingly, on Friday two of the three new inductees were on hand to accept their awards. The journalist, whom more than 80 guests - including Gov. Ben Nelson and Secretary of State Scott Moore - expected to be there, called his induction “unbelievable” “I wasn’t even aware they had this thing,” Oldfield said of the Hall of Fame. “But to go in with these other two is a staggering thing for me.” A Tecumseh native, Oldfield began his jour nalism career as a stringer for the venerable enter tainment magazine, Variety, and as a sports stringer at The Lincoln Star. His career took an accidental step forward in 1931 after receiving a free movie pass to see “The Please see OLDFIELD on 2 Read the Daily Nebraskan on the World Wide Web at http:/ / www.unl.edu /DailyNeb