NEWS

SGA Addresses Campus Events
Cassie Dailey | Staff Reporter

The Student Government Association had its first formal meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 6, ushering in the fall semester.
Student Government President Will Morefield was very eager to discuss the Texas Legislature’s approval of the non-voting Student Regent position.
This position will allow a student to be present for the quarterly Board of Regents meetings. Although, he or she will not be able to vote, “This newly established position will represent students in discussions of key issues in higher education,” said Morefield.
The Student Regent is the highest position a student can hold while enrolled in a Texas public college. It is, in fact, a more powerful position than student government president.
“At every regent meeting, they always have the opportunity to talk about any subject, from parking to the wellness center,” said Dr. Howard Farrell, vice president of university advancement and student affairs. “There’s not a single committee, task force or group on this campus that does not have student input.”
Students must apply for this position by 5:00pm on September 30, 2005 in the Student Affairs Office.
Homecoming is another hot topic around campus. This year’s homecoming will be Harley themed and will take place October 19-23.
Matthew Park, Director of Student Activities and New Student Orientation, said that some of the events offered this year include a Vanessa Carlton concert and The Evasons, which is “an astounding magic and mind reader show.”
Of course, the traditional all-campus picnic, torchlight parade and bonfire, and fish fry will take place. The all-campus picnic will include some fun new activities such as 3-D flip photos, airbrush tattoos, a rock climbing wall, bouncy boxing, and a velcro wall, and
“Homecoming is the largest program of the fall semester at Midwestern,” Said Parks. “What has taken months of planning will cultivate into four solid days of fun and enjoyment for MSU students, alumni and guests.”
As always, Homecoming weekend will also be littered with various MSU sporting events. More information regarding homecoming and sporting events is available at the information desk in CSC. 
 

Booked Up offers slice of Heaven
Konnie Sewell | Opinion Editor

Among the A-shaped electrical towers and ranches surrounded by barbed wire on the way to Archer City, there is a strange patch of land that would give anyone the creeps, even in broad daylight.
Dry and splintered trees twist and poke this way and that out of the ground, not unlike something from a Tim Burton movie. It’s a veritable tree graveyard. It sort of makes sense, then, that there's a certain kind of paradise waiting for you once you are actually inside the city.
Archer City — home to 1,848 people and one lonely stoplight — hosts Booked Up, an antiquarian bookstore owned by author Larry McMurtry. The store originated in Washington, D.C.’s Georgetown neighborhood in 1970.
“Washington is an old town,” McMurtry said. “It’s a city that’s filled with history and books galore. We set up the bookstore and got a lot of books from all over — my personal collection, from the government and from other book sellers.”
In 1988 McMurtry, who won a Pulitzer Prize for “Lonesome Dove,” decided to relocate the store to his hometown of Archer City. He currently lives in Tucson, Ariz., because of allergies, but visits the store often.
“When I come back I finalize large purchases, help set the prices, and distribute the books,” McMurtry said. “That’s the fun of it.”
Booked Up actually consists of four buildings in the downtown part of the city, checkered along the main street. Without flashy billboards or designs, the buildings don’t stand out, but they’re not exactly hard to miss, either.
It seems as though they are just another integral part of the city, like the bank, post office or museum. There is truly something for everyone in the second, third and fourth buildings. Unfortunately, books are not arranged in any specific order, but topics range from medicine and television to occult and western pulp fiction, with literally everything in between.
The first building, however, is where all newcomers should start their journey. A letter addressed to “our customers, alarmed or otherwise” is posted on the front door, reassuring everyone Booked Up is here to stay —
for now, at least. “There was a scare, when we thought we might have to shut down,” McMurtry said. “It was a combination of things, really. In the mid-90s, urban real estate started to go up, so a lot of bookshops became Internet book sellers, and some people don’t travel as much as they used to. We really started to get worried in April of 2001, but the store’s going to be around for a while. We’re safe for now, but it could happen again.”
The showcase room, annex and garage are located in the first building. Simply being in the same room with these rare, out of print, signed and first editions is enough to make any bookworm gush. Customers are friendly but reverently quiet, much like one would expect at a library.
Curiously, McMurtry said most of the people in the city don’t actually visit the bookstore. “About 99.9999 percent of the people who come into the store are out of state or country,” he said. “Only a very few — one or two, maybe — are actually from Archer. I guess it’s not a reader’s town. We’ve got people coming in from Minnesota, Kansas, the Dakotas, California and even England and Australia. Those people have to stay overnight and have to eat, so I hope we’re an asset to the town.”
Visitors are greeted by friendly employees when they walk in who seem to be on a first-name basis with McMurtry. Leo, a handsome, friendly, black and white cat, also greets them.
This building, however, can make even the most intrepid visitor depressed.
The books here are more pricey than the rest; a first-edition copy of “The Courtship of Miles Standish” goes for $300, and there is no negotiating of prices. Many books are simply not for sale, but there are many paperback ones that start at $15.
Every store has its faults, but overall, Booked Up is worth checking out. The realization that you are in a room with books many people will never see, much less get to touch and flip through in their lifetimes, is a little
awe inspiring.
McMurtry said he doesn’t plan on changing anything about the store any time soon, which may be the secret to its success. “We constantly have scouts out looking for new stores to acquire,” he said.
“Sometimes we’ve got 100 of them out at a time. We’re just going to continue buying books and buying bookstores, the same things we’ve been doing for years.”


Housing overflow Persists on Campus
Micaela Lechuga | Staff Reporter

Along with the rise of overflow in our parking lots is the overflow in our university’s resident housing. The dilemma of finding students a place to live, however, opens new options and planning for future expansion.
So what do students do in the meantime?
Director of Housing and Residence Life Daniel Reddick said students are being placed in apartment complexes such as Tiffany Place apartments.
Prices for the apartments off campus are not different from what they would be expected to pay at Killingsworth or Pierce.
“We pay the bills, cable, everything,” Reddick said. “It’s a good value for students.”
Determining which student gets to live in the dorms, Sunwatcher or apartments off campus is done by deposit date.
‘Deposit dates are done by classification, so for example a junior would get their first choice before a freshman,” Reddick said.
The students who live off campus have a resident assistant as they would in the dorms.
“We do everything we can to make it comfortable for students. There is professional staff provided and we try to move them on campus as soon as possible,” Reddick said.
He believes a student living off campus is not the best-case scenario.
“For freshmen, this is the first time they are away from their parents’ house. They need a little more structure because they may not be ready for that kind of independence yet,” Reddick said.
Reddick says they are usually able to return to on-campus housing in the spring.
More so, overflow is not considered a pressing problem, but housing numbers have been increasing over the past few years.
“It’s been increasing the last four years that I have been here,” Reddick said. “In the fall semesters at least.”
In the past three years, 336 beds have been added and all currently are filled. There are about 23 people in an overflow situation.
Talks of future expansion are in the works for the MSU committee.
“There is truth to it,” Associate Vice President of Students Affairs Keith Lamb said. “We are looking at the possibility of a Greek Row but things must fall into place.”
Along with Lamb and Reddick, the dean of students, director of student development, the representatives of the Greek chapters and their advisors make up the committee that are in the process of evaluating whether Greek housing is in high enough demand.
“It is a lengthy process. First we have to satisfy questions of worth, and then we make a recommendation to administration,” Lamb said.
They consider the recommendation by studying and evaluating it.
“If they say yes, it must be approved by the Board of Regents at the institution level and then at state level,” Lamb said.
Both administrators agree that Greek housing would be good for the university, as well as valuable for housing.
“It would relieve some of the pressure on housing. Last year, with the success of Sunwatcher, we think it might be an appropriate time for it, along with additional apartments,” Lamb said.  “With a growing student body there is no question about the need for additional housing.”
Last year’s recruitment to Greek organizations garnered 328 new members.
“There are other priorities that need to be in effect first. For instance, parking,” senior BAAS major Jeanette Perry said. “When I have to park all the way on the other side of campus there’s a problem. It’s much worse this year with the new building.”
For Perry, she does not think Greeks are a big enough force on campus to come before something essential like parking spots.
“There’s not a whole lot of Greeks here. I can understand if we were on a different campus where the chapters are bigger and there’s a need for it,” Perry said. “I think it would just become one big party house like it has been everywhere else.”




"Dynamite" producer's visit draws large crowd to Thursday's screening
Ashley Miller | Managing Editor

Shawnee Theater was packed for Thursday night’s screening of “Napoleon Dynamite,” the unexpected sensation that swept America in 2004 and continues to gain a larger following by the day.
The crowd may have been because of the popularity of the movie, but probably had more to do with the presence of Sean Covel, one of the producers of “Dynamite.”
Dr. Melanie Conrad, a speech professor at MSU, taught Covel at the University of Nebraska, where he got his undergraduate degree. Covel described their relationship as close because of the many trips they took for debate.
“It was me and nine women traveling the country,” he said.
So when Conrad e-mailed him and asked him to make a trip to MSU to visit with the film club and attend the screening of his movie, Covel was all for it.
“I’d go to the opening of an envelope if you invite me,” he said.
“Dynamite” is the story of a geeky small-town high school student who tries to help his equally geeky friend get elected to the student council. It was based on a student film written and directed by Jared Hess (the writer and director of “Dynamite”), made for $500. Covel said the main reason his production company decided to make the movie was because they wanted to see it. They had no idea how popular it would become. But Covel has an idea why it happened.
“It emphasized geek chic at a time when Hollywood emphasized pretty,” he said. In essence, it made being uncool cool.
Raised in a small town himself (Edgemont, S.D.), Covel felt drawn to the movie and the very real truth behind it. Many of the scenes in the movie were in fact based on real experiences of the cast and crew.
“My life was resoundingly similar to Napoleon Dynamite’s, much to my dismay,” he said.
The movie was filmed in Preston, Idaho, the actual hometown of Hess. The crew quickly acclimated to small-town life and in fact began to enjoy it.
In Covel’s visits with different classes, he recalled some of the most memorable moments during filming. Uncle Rico’s van, he said, was a spontaneous decision. Once they had made arrangements with the owners to use it, they couldn’t get rid of them. He said they made frequent requests of the crew, such as asking for toilet paper.
“How can you deny a person toilet paper?” he said. Even after filming was complete, they were receiving phone calls.
When Haylie Duff, who plays Summer, was on set, her dog ran away. The crew assumed it was eaten by a mountain lion after the filming was replaced on the front page of the town’s newspaper by an elderly woman who killed one of the beasts with a cast-iron skillet.
For aspiring filmmakers, Covel had this to say: “Movies are possible because we dream. The key to being successful is to be creating all the time.”
With marketable content and the right resources, he said, anyone can get financing and become a success.
Covel, who was visiting Texas for the first time, said he was really enjoying the experience.
“We went to McBride’s for lunch. There were a number of saddles there,” he said. “The amount of barbecue here is amazing!”


MSU Hires new Director for Newly-Acquired MAC
Michelle Ward | Staff Reporter

A former State Department employee is now heading up the Wichita Falls Museum and Art Center.
Things are changing at the MAC because MSU now owns the museum, and a new director works the silent halls.
Cohn Drennan, 47, a tall, bald man with a beaming smile, is more than familiar with the museum world.  He previously worked for the State Department, in Washington D.C., for fifteen years as the deputy director of Art in Embassies.  While traveling all over the world, Drennan supervised 60 exhibitions and shipped them to the U.S. Embassies.  In fact, this time last year he was over seas trading and supervising art exhibitions.   
 While taking a pay cut from his previous position, Drennan said “making less money is not a big issue.” “I love the concept of doing something important and challenging,” he said.  The director position possesses many similarities to his previous job but without the travel.  Drennan admits he loved his job at the State Department but shows excitement when talking about traveling leisurely instead of professionally.  He likes the idea of being in one museum now.  Also, the traffic here suits him better he said.
After being director for only a week, Drennan has already planned so much.  However, change creates his number one challenge.  He understands the process may be a slow one. 
“People want it but are afraid of it,” he attests. 
Evaluating the museum’s resources is one of the first things on Drennan’s to do list.  He wants to deliver to the community the best way possible.  Being open minded about what the museum can offer the community is important to him.
He recognizes the need for a diverse perspective and wants to get students more involved in the museum.
“Students are an important constituency to the museum,” Drennan said. 
The museum offers space to students who aim to share their creations.  Students can possibly benefit from internships, labs and workshops.  Drennan hopes to develop a student committee for the museum. 
Bringing in organized groups from the community can accomplish more of Drennan’s goals as director.  He asks, “What can we do to make it work?” “Once you create a reason you can get the job done,” he said.  
 Drennan knows the communities’ role is vital for the museums survival.  He wants to work with the community to coordinate goals beneficial for both.  In fact, in March the museum will be doing a membership campaign to reintroduce itself to the community.  The museum is not just about art, and he recognizes this.  Drennan is focused on getting the Wichita Falls and MSU communities more involved in the museum.
Staff at the museum is limited, so each member must do his or her fair share of the work.  Drennan hopes the museum can develop and curate some new exhibitions of its own such as southwest and children exhibitions.  He prefers this method of exhibition over trading with other museums because the museum can create its own unique identity.  Although he is currently trying to get an exhibition named the Pretoria from a South African museum to come to the MAC.  This exhibit would bring in some of the diversity he wants portrayed at the museum.
After leaving his home in Burke, Virginia, Drennan became the director of the MAC on September 1st.  He is still living out of boxes.  However, he is not new to Texas.  He grew up in Abilene and seems to feel right at home in Wichita Falls.  The people here have welcomed his family with warm hospitality he said. 
His work in many museums around the world gives him the knowledge of how they operate and the awareness of their diversity.  His calmness and confidence prove his knowledge of the field.
“A good director should possess a clear vision and express it where everyone can understand it,” Drennan said. “Good business skills and diplomacy are a must.”
Smiles and passion about the museum business beam off of him.  He speaks about the generosity of the art community when it comes to borrowing paintings.  He said, “Once you’ve established a relationship you can borrow a $5 million painting.”
In his spare time, painting his own art offers Drennan another source of work.   He travels the country doing shows at museums.  Currently, he is painting a new series for exhibition.
After undergoing what he calls the most intense interview process of his life and relocating his family, Drennan has sacrificed a lot to become director and can bring new ideas to the MAC.  Drennan believes he is up to the challenge. He has given so much. His life has completely changed.  He not only likes the pace of traffic here, he likes change of pace his new job offers as museum director.