A month in a mansion
Posted on Thursday, May 8, 2008
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/adg/Editorial/225079/
It appears that the outgoing
chancellor at the University of Arkansas at
Fayetteville, the man who removed Houston Nutt’s golden handcuffs and helped raise a billion dollars for the university, will beat his successor into the sparkling new $ 2. 7 million Chancellor’s Mansion by one month. Dr. John White and wife Mary Lib will unpack for the month of June, but only until incoming Chancellor G. David Gearhart takes office. This means that the Whites likely won’t unwrap the fine china before moving out of the newly completed Wallace and Jama Fowler House as White heads for the campus’ industrial engineering classrooms. If I had the chance to spend an expense-paid month in an 11, 800-squarefoot mansion on three acres, I’d have the U-Haul truck at the door. In all honesty, though, I’m not sure I could feel good about doing it if I realized that my replacement was packing for the same move. I’d be concerned about denting a wall or fouling up the plumbing.
There’s something special about the smell and feel of anything new. An odometer seems almost magical with two miles showing as compared with, say, 5, 000, don’t you think ?
It is true that the Whites have been involved in raising the private funds to build this elegant abode, which I affectionately call the Taj Mahog. I sent Doc White an e-mail to ask about his planned visitation / occupation. I figured that, being a Harrison boy like me, he must be getting pretty excited about the shiny floors, fancy fixtures, high ceilings and such. Never heard a peep back. He was probably too rushed to bother answering that Masterson jerk who provoked several royal pains over his decade of rule. Can’t rightfully say as I blame him.
However, White’s spokesperson, Tysen Kendig, responded for him, saying: “Both Dr. and Mrs. White have been very involved in this project since its inception and throughout the private fund-raising and construction process, and I know they are looking forward to seeing the residence completed and spending some time in it as he concludes his career as chancellor.”
After the Whites depart, Gearhart told me, he and his wife Jane will arrive sometime after his official start day of July 1. What next ?
I always enjoy speaking to civic groups. They wonder what it’s like still trying to throw out first pitches at Razorback baseball games.
This week I traveled home to provide noontime dessert for the Harrison Kiwanis Club, which apparently was desperate for a speaker.
After singing “My Country ’Tis of Thee,” reciting the Pledge of Allegiance and offering prayer, I did explain the wayward pitch from two years back that wound up in the dugout. Then I quickly changed the subject to explain what I believe every newspaper should represent in its community.
I believe those good folks actually understood my ramblings as I relayed the critical need for papers to produce relevant (and often controversial ) stories that disclose truth wherever it leads. My problem is that the majority fail to even come close. Instead, they offer simple feature stories or accounts of meetings and boring bureaucratic processes rather than digging beneath the surface of pressing issues. There exists great reluctance to seek and report truth even when it screams to be freed.
The result, sad to say, is that every community without an assertive and reliable paper remains largely uninformed and unenlightened—except by word of mouth and the Internet—about matters that demand careful thought and action. Shirking responsibility is not why we have a First Amendment. I believe that this constitutional provision expects the Fourth Estate to be a watchdog that questions and ensures the public’s best interests are upheld. There was understandable concern in the room over the state’s latest “undetermined” findings in the 1989 Janie Ward case. I was asked what the Ward family can do now. My response, as always, was that someone with authority has to insist on honest accountability. Various state agencies are directly involved in the circumstances surrounding Janie’s case, which means the state can never credibly investigate itself. So much truth already lies bare, making deception and nonsense easily seen. Of the many significant cases I’ve waded into over 37 years, Janie’s takes the cake and now deserves federal involvement. I’ve wondered many times how this case would have unfolded had Janie not been born into a poor, white family from the Ozarks.
—–––––•–––––—Staff columnist Mike Masterson is the former editor of three Arkansas daily newspapers.