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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (March 4, 2015)
O3,N,ON 6A T HE Richard :agner did not start :orld :ar ,, D AILY A STORIAN Founded in 1873 STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor BETTY SMITH, Advertising Manager CARL EARL, Systems Manager JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager SAMANTHA MCLAREN, Circulation Manager Water under the bridge Compiled by Bob Duke From the pages of Astoria’s daily newspapers 10 years ago this week — 2005 The Wickiup Restaurant and Lounge on Old Highway 30 at the Svensen Junction burned to the ground this morning. :KHQWKH.QDSSD)LUH'HSDUWPHQWDUULYHGDWDPÀDPHVZHUH visible and heavy smoke was coming from the entire building, Fire Chief Paul Olheiser said. “We tried to do an offensive attack, but we lost water,” Olheiser said. A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data buoy was recovered by the U.S. Coast Guard Saturday 300 miles west of Astoria after it broke free from its mooring. The Astoria bypass concept is back on the drawing board. The on-again, off-again issue of a new highway to stop large trucks from causing congestion through downtown Astoria has been one of the lon- gest-running sagas in the community in the last three decades. U.S. Rep. David Wu, D-Ore., announced that $250,000 is being targeted for a new study. “This project would study the feasibility of a bypass from Youngs Bay Bridge, off U.S. Highway 101, up and over state forest land to join up with U.S. Highway 30 near the John Day Bridge,” Wu said. 50 years ago — 1965 Both construction methods and inspection procedures were criticized in three reports dealing with the collapse of the John Day 5iver highway bridge during Christmas week Àoods. Gov. 0ark +at¿eld released the reports late 7uesday. None was as blunt as Highway Commission Chairman Glenn Jackson, who told a special legislative hearing in January “we made an error in judgment.” $:DKNLDNXP&RXQW\GHOHJDWLRQKDVWHVWL¿HGEHIRUHD6HQDWH+LJKZD\ committee hearing at Olympia, urging construction of the Grays River-Pe Ell road. Those testifying were Carlton Appelo, Wahkiakum Pomona grange mas- ter, County Commissioner Howard Madden, Robert Torppa and William Canham. $SSHORWHVWL¿HGWKHURDGZRXOGGHYHORS:DKNLDNXPDJULFXOWXUDOO\E\ putting its products near to processing plants in Lewis County. Madden em- phasized that it would open up new recreational areas. Torppa noted that the QHZ&URZQ=HOOHUEDFKPLOODW:DXQDZRXOGGHYHORSWUDI¿FLQWKHUHJLRQ The road would shorten the distance between Astoria and Puget Sound FLWLHVE\PLOHV(VWLPDWHGFRVWLVPLOOLRQ7UDI¿FYROXPHZLWKWKH $VWRULDEULGJH¿QLVKHGKDVEHHQSUHGLFWHGDWFDUVGDLO\E\ 7he ¿rst train in more than a month may roll over the S3S line into Astoria and Seaside tonight. 7here has been no train west of :estport since January 30, a month ago Sunday, as a result of a slide that wiped out more than a mile of track between :auna and Bradwood. &LW\DQGFRXQW\RI¿FLDOVDUHWRPHHWWRGLVFXVVFRRSHUDWLRQLQGRJFRQ- trol, a problem which has plagued the community for a long time but has not been solved. The fundamental trouble is that the public wants dogs controlled, appar- ently, but doesn’t want to have to pay for it. 75 years ago — 1940 Max Lehmann, for 20 years a successful packing executive and son of a pioneer European vegetable canner, will open the 1940 era of Astoria’s industrial growth, having signed a lease for use, and perhaps ultimate purchase, of the Astoria port cannery at the port docks. Lehmann’s proposed program with peas and other vegetables may take its place in 1940 along with the tuna industry, which sprang into the spotlight in 1939 as a development of prime im- portance to this lower Columbia community. +LVWRU\UHPHPEHUV-RKQ06KLYHO\DVWKH¿UVWSRVWPDVWHUZHVWRIWKH Rocky mountains and the distinction thereby given Astoria’s mail-distribut- ing point for the entire northwest. Descendants remember particularly the mistreatment he received at the hands of his fellow townsmen, for John M. Shively literally was run out of Astoria, the town he planned and laid out. Such is the revelation produced by personal, well-documented papers in Shively’s longhand just made public by Mrs. Charles Meyer, granddaughter, living at 2034 Southeast Grant Street. Shively’s comeback to Astoria was marked by his commission as a post- master, and his experience as an adviser to congress on a feasible boundary line between Great Britain’s Canada and the United States in the Oregon country. 7he year 1939 will always be a red-letter ¿gure in the history of Astoria as well as the whole state of Oregon, for it was in that year that a long, long struggle to get the Columbia River on the navy’s defense map was completed. 7he year saw congress at last authorize the establishment of a naval air station at 7ongue 3oint, where a naval board had ¿rst recommended some kind of a defense establishment in 1900; also saw the appropriation of $1,500,000 to be spent on construction of the station over a two-year period and ¿nally saw the actual beginning of construction, with more than half a million in con- tracts already allotted at the year’s end. John Jacob Astor, the New York fur trader for whom this city is named, and who founded it, was ¿rst to see the strategic impor- tance of the mouth of the Columbia River more than a century and a quarter ago. He it was who selected the mouth of the Co- lumbia for his combination fort and trading post in 1811, which was to control the trade of the entire northwest region and which was the ¿rst white man’s settlement in all this part of the world. THE DAILY ASTORIAN • WEDNESDAY, MARCH 4, 2015 7 HERE IS NO MORE GLYLVLYH¿JXUHLQFODVVLFDO music than Richard Wagner. I’ve ceased to be amazed at musically literate persons who deliberately won’t listen to Wagner. My wife and I traveled to Chi- cago last weekend to see a pro- duction of Wagner’s Tannhauser, a work about the tension between sensuality and spirituality. We were joined by one of my oldest friends, Alice Porter of Seattle. The best description I’ve read of Wagner’s music is that it is “densely harmonic.” It is also monumental. This opera lasted only three hours. In the Wagner canon, that is brief. ‘The time has come,’ the Walrus said, ‘To talk of many things; Of shoes — and ships — and sealing wax — Of cabbages —and kings —’ Through the Looking-glass of Cabbages and Kings źźź THERE IS NO BETTER setting for opera than the Lyric Opera of Chicago. The auditorium is gold, coral and blue. Shafts of wheat are iconic elements in lighting elements and wall decor. Tannhauser is seldom per- IRUPHGEHFDXVHLWLVKDUGWR¿HOG the array of great voices he calls for. We learned that on Monday night when the great South Afri- can tenor Johan Botha was ill. His replacement, Richard Decker, had a very bad night. Fortunately, Am- ber Wagner, who has sung in Asto- ria, and others made up for it. In this opera there is enough talk of atonement, redemption and VDOYDWLRQ IRU DERXW ¿YH FKXUFK services. The Pilgrims Chorus, with which the opera closes, is a profound, inspirational piece of music. źźź AT THE TIME OF THE American Civil War, Wagner Richard Wagner In Chicago we learned why Tannhauser is so seldom performed. book about Jews in music adds to the emotion that repels some who have never heard his music. For decades following World War II, Israel prohibited the playing of Wagner’s music in that country. That ban has been breached by three conductors in- cluding Zubin Mehta, a Holocaust survivor named Mendi Rodan and Daniel Barenboim, an Argentine Jew. ,Q KLV ERRN Wagner, Michael Tanner writes: “What is it about Richard Wagner that makes him, 112 years after his death, still so violently contro- versial? The easy answer would be ‘Everything,’ but it would not be quite right. For no one — no serious musician — any longer doubts that his place among the PRVW VLJQL¿FDQW FRPSRVHUV LV now secure.” — S.A.F. was changing the world of PXVLF $ WKFHQWXU\ PDQ KLV LQÀXHQFHLVIHOWZHOOLQWRWKHWK century. And one man who was especially moved by his music was Adolf Hitler. In the opening PRPHQWV RI 1D]L ¿OPPDNHU /HQL Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will, one of Wagner’s overtures is the soundtrack as Hitler’s small plane ÀLHV WRZDUG WKH SDUW\ UDOO\ LQ Nuremberg. Like many artists, Wagner pres- ents a problem as a person. His How :arren Buffett does it and unnecessary fees ... and the use of borrowed money can destroy the decent returns that a life-long owner of equities would otherwise ifty years ago, a young enjoy.” investor named Warren Another thing about Buffett is Buffett took control of a failing that he has never gotten caught up textile company, Berkshire in fads. He only buys businesses that he understands and can predict Hathaway. “I found myself ... where the business will be in a de- invested in a terrible business cade. He teaches this point in the about which current letter with a discussion of the conglomerates that sprung up I knew very LQ WKH V DQG EHFDPH WKH KRW little,” Buffett stocks of the moment. Jimmy Ling, relates in who ran one such company, LTV, his annual used to say that he looked for ac- quisitions where “2 plus 2 equals letter to AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File 5.” shareholders, Billionaire investor Warren Buffett LTV, as conceived by Ling, of which was speaks in Omaha, Neb., at an event course, ceased to exist decades released over to raise money for the Girls Inc., ago (though the company would charity organization in November go through several transforma- Joe the weekend. 2011. Warren Buffett’s annual letter tions and bankruptcy court before Nocera “I became to Berkshire Hathaway sharehold- shuttering its last vestige in 2002). the dog who ers is always one of the best-read “Never forget that 2 + 2 will al- business documents of the year. ways equal 4,” writes Buffett. caught the car.” Buffett describes his approach in The 2015 letter, due to be released “And when someone tells you how those days as “cigar butt” investing; on Saturday Feb. 28, marks the old-fashioned that math is — zip 50th year of Buffett’s leadership. up your wallet, take a vacation and buying shares of troubled companies come back in a few years to buy with underpriced stocks was “like How successful has the Buf- stocks at cheap prices.” picking up a discarded cigar butt fett-Munger approach been? In the If it’s really this simple, why that had one puff remaining in it,” 50 years since Buffett took over don’t more people try to invest like he writes. “Though the stub might Berkshire, its stock has appreciat- Buffett? One reason, I think, is that be ugly and soggy, the puff would ed by 1,826,163 percent. That is an sound investing — buying when others are selling, holding for the astounding number. be free.” He continues: “Most of You would think, given Buf- long term, avoiding the hot stocks my gains in those early years ... fett’s success, that more people — requires a stronger stomach than came from investments in mediocre would try to emulate his approach most people have. When a stock companies that traded at bargain to investing. It is not as if he hasn’t is plummeting, it takes a certain tried to explain how he does it. strength to buy even more instead prices.” Every year, you can find a Buffett of selling in a panic. Most of us But that approach had limits. tutorial in his annual letter that the lack the temperament required for It took Charlie Munger, the Los rest of us would do well to absorb smart investing. The fundamental equanimity required to be a great Angeles lawyer who has been his — and practice. investor is a rare thing. longtime sidekick, to The second reason is show him that there was another way to The fundamental equanimity required that investing the War- Buffett way is a lot win at the investing to be a great investor is a rare thing. ren more complicated than game: “Forget what you he makes it sound. Can know about buying fair businesses at wonderful prices,” In the current letter, for in- you predict where a business will Munger told him. “Instead, buy stance, he makes the case — which be in 10 years? Of course not. But wonderful businesses at fair pric- has been made many times before he can — and does. In a few months, the faithful es.” Which is what Buffett’s been — that a diversified portfolio of doing ever since. stocks “that are bought over time will flock to Omaha, Neb., to at- He has done it in two ways. First and that are owned in a manner tend Berkshire’s annual meeting — — and this is what he is renowned invoking only token fees and com- “Woodstock for capitalists,” Buf- for — he has bought stock in some missions” are less risky over the fett likes to call it. For six hours, of the great American companies long term than other investment Buffett and Munger will be on of our time, stock that he has held vehicles that are tied to the dollar. stage, before some 40,000 people, not just for years, but for decades. Clearly, that’s been his approach. cracking wise, while making their Second, he has turned Berkshire He then goes on to bemoan the fact investment decisions sound like Hathaway into a true conglomer- that too many investors — both simplicity itself. But, in coming to pay their an- ate, which owns not just stocks but little guys and investment profes- entire companies. Although Berk- sionals — do things that add risk: nual homage, the throngs will not shire’s front office employs only “Active trading, attempts to ‘time’ be acknowledging the simplicity of 25 people, its companies have, in market movements, inadequate di- Buffett’s approach, but the genius total, some 340,500 employees. versification, the payment of high behind it. By JOE NOCERA New York Times News Service F