Boy wonder Rory McIlroy wins British Open for 3rd major Sports, B-1
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Monday, July 21, 2014
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Separatists stash crash victims’ bodies in boxcars
Feds report dip in child crossings
Actions draw condemnation, accusations that rebels are tampering with evidence related to the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17. PAGE A-3
Officials hope fewer apprehensions indicate the recent surge in young migrants is starting to wane. PAGE A-10
Scores killed as fighting in Gaza escalates
Hope, if not work, found at ‘Survival Corner’
Contract offer shot down by hospital workers
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white Ram pickup with enough cargo space for a dozen passengers created a moment of hope on what some call Survival Corner. As the driver eased to the crossroads of Guadalupe and Agua Fría streets one cool morning, 20 men in grimy work clothes hustled to form a crooked line. Nearly all were disappointed when the truck pulled away a minute later. Milan The driver Simonich hired just one Ringside Seat man, leaving all the other day laborers to stand and wait for the next prospect. Mostly immigrants, the men gather each morning at the same spot. Everybody in the work pool knows that people who need landscapers, cleaning crews or furniture movers could arrive any moment. Jobs are precious, and those who hold down a place on the corner may get one, if only for a few hours. Ricordo Vasquez is one of the more relentless day laborers. He walks 40 minutes each morning to reach the corner. On the slowest days, he waits eight hours for a job before giving up until the next morning. Vasquez is from Torreón, Mexico, but he considers Santa Fe home. He said he was employed at a hotel for more than three years, happy for all the dirty work that came his way. “Security, maintenance, clean the rooms, plug up toilets,” is his rendition of all the duties he performed.
Please see RINGSIDE, Page A-5
Today Partly sunny; storms possible. High 92, low 62. PAGE A-12
Obituaries Arthur Jennings Baker Jr., July 15
At least 60 Palestinians and 13 Israeli soldiers and officers died in the Shejaiya neighborhood alone Sunday, rattling the international community. PAGE A-4
Former All-American Girls Professional Baseball League players Doris ‘Cookie‘ Cook (in blue T-shirt) and Maybelle Blair (in white, behind Cook) shake fans’ hands Sunday as they arrive at the Santa Fe Depot Rail Runner station. PHOTOS BY CLYDE MUELLER/THE NEW MEXICAN
Union, unhappy with staffing levels, will issue strike notice
All-American welcome
By Patrick Malone
for the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (which was known by several other names) between 1943 and 1954. About 100 survive today, he said. As World War II kicked in for America, many minor league baseball teams began to disband as their members joined the ranks of the military. Chewing gum magnate Philip K. Wrigley, who owned the Chicago Cubs franchise, organized a committee to come up with a plan to keep the crowds rolling in. The answer was an all-women’s baseball league.
Union nurses and medical technicians at Santa Fe’s only general hospital overwhelmingly rejected a contract offer late Sunday that the administration of Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center had characterized as its best and last. By a margin of 95 percent to 5 percent, nurses in District 1999 New Mexico of the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees, turned down the contract, and 80 percent of technicians snubbed the offer. “It wasn’t just a no vote, it was a hell no vote,” one nurse blurted out exuberantly as news of the rejection came down at the Center for Progress and Justice, where the vote was held. Nurses in attendance said differences with the hospital over staffing levels inspired their no votes. Rejection of the contract offer triggered a notice of intent to strike from the union to the hospital. The current contract, negotiated in 2011, expires July 31. Union President Fonda Osborn said the union will present the hospital with notice of plans to strike on Monday, however she is hopeful that the hospital’s administration will return to the table for two negotiating sessions on Friday and Saturday that had been scheduled for months. “We’ll be giving them a formal letter [Monday] suggesting we get back to the bargaining table as soon as possible, and then we’ll see where we go from there,” Osborn said. As of 11 p.m. Sunday, Christus St. Vincent officials were still awaiting word from the union about the outcome of the vote, according to hospital spokesman Arturo Delgado. “We are disappointed that the union has chosen to take this negative action and reject a contract that included reasonable staffing and pay incentives,” Delgado said when he learned of the vote. “We are cautiously optimistic of reaching an agreement and ironing out final details of a contract during two of the negotiation sessions scheduled for this week,” he added.
Please see PLAYERS, Page A-5
Please see CONTRACT, Page A-5
Professional female baseball players who inspired ‘A League of Their Own’ receive warm reception in Santa Fe By Robert Nott The New Mexican
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heir run was modest, their fame fleeting. They mostly played baseball in the Midwest, sporting such nicknames as “Buckets” and “Hustle” and “Wimp.” Yet they broke ground by playing in the country’s first professional women’s baseball league, one that lasted over a decade. And when it came to an end in 1954, they retired their baseball bats, gloves and uniforms and went on to other things — teaching, doctoring, acting as housewives. For the most part, their stories — if they bothered to tell them — were forgotten within a few years. But with the release of Penny Marshall’s 1992 film A League of Their Own, the members of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League began to attract new fans and belated recognition. On Sunday, nearly 30 of the players, most in their 80s, arrived in Santa Fe via the New Mexico Rail Runner Express as part of their annual reunion, held in Albuquerque this year. Several hundred people made the train trip from Albuquerque to Santa Fe with the ladies, and an enthusiastic crowd of another
Former player Mary Louise ‘Wimp’ Baumgartner, signs an autograph for a fan at the Railyard on Sunday.
100 awaited them at the station. Members of the New Mexico Women’s Choir serenaded the veteran players with a trio of period tunes, including “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing).” Then the players signed autographs and shared stories with fans before embarking on an afternoon of sightseeing around town. Kris Shepard, creative services manager for the Isotopes in Albuquerque, helped orchestrate the New Mexico reunion after he met two of the players several years ago at a Society for American Baseball Research event. He said about 600 women played
The New Mexican
PAGE A-10
Pasapick www.pasatiempomagazine.com
Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival 42nd annual event features 10 a.m. free youth concert by the Percussion Ensemble; 6 p.m. concert: music of Schubert, Brahms and Julian Anderson, performers include violinist Jennifer Frautschi, cellist Wilhelmina Sith and pianist Alessio Bax, $10-$75; St. Francis Auditorium, New Mexico Museum of Art, 107 W. Palace Ave., 982-1890, santafechambermusic.com.
Index
Calendar A-2
Classifieds B-6
OPERA REVIEW
Double bill features dueling divas, top-flight nightingale SFO creatively melds Mozart, Stravinsky works into new entity By James M. Keller The New Mexican
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he idea of pairing Mozart’s The Impresario with Stravinsky’s Le rossignol might seem the strangest of conceits, but in a new production by director Michael Gieleta, unveiled Saturday night at The Santa Fe Opera, the two pieces coalesce into a smart, inventively synchro-
Comics B-12
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Crosswords B-7, B-11
nized entity that is greater than the sum of its parts. Both works are problem pieces. The Impresario (Der Schauspieldirektor, as Mozart titled it), was a divertissement penned for a Viennese court entertainment in 1786, a silly little throwaway about a beleaguered opera impresario trying to survive the temperamental rivalries of his leading singers — most vehemently his sopranos. Its score comprises only an orchestral overture, two arias and two vocal ensembles, which originally were eked out by interpolated playacting on topics that were popular
Life & Science A-9
El Nuevo A-7
and resonant at the time. Admirable though Mozart’s contribution is, it is insufficient in quantity and dramatic balance to yield a satisfying stage work on its own. Le rossignol also has issues. Composed over nearly six years, from 1908 through 1914, it spanned a period during which Stravinsky’s musical language evolved considerably. The resulting piece, which Stravinsky described as “a kind of opera-pageant ballet,” is Janus-like, the first of its three continuous acts looking back toward the glittering nationalism of Rimsky-
Opinions A-11
Please see DOUBLE, Page A-5
Sports B-1
Tech A-8
Time Out B-11
BREAKING NEWS AT WWW.SANTAFENEWMEXICAN.COM
The Nightingale, played beautifully by soprano Erin Morley, sings in front of Anthony MichaelsMoore’s Emperor in Le rossignol at The Santa Fe Opera. COURTESY KEN HOWARD SFO
Two sections, 24 pages 165th year, No. 202 Publication No. 596-440