Looking At The Old South Through Hazel Eyes

There were about 125 students in the Gadsden, Alabama High School senior class of 1930. The editor of the yearbook had the bright idea of using three adjectives to describe each member of the class. Under the name of Hazel Brannon, it read: "Industrious, Independent, Indomitable."

The End Of The Soviet Empire

When Leonid Brezhnev praised Hungarian agriculture at the Soviet Party Congress in 1981, Hungarian farmers complained that so many delegations from the Soviet Union descended on them they could not collect their harvest. Though the Hungarians were supposed to be flattered by Brezhnev’s attention, they could not stomach the primitive peasants who mistook Hungary for the West and spent their evenings, Russian style, drinking boisterously in local bars.

Meet Dr. Deming, Corporate America’s Newest Guru

FALMOUTH, MASS.–At long, long last, W. Edwards Deming is a prophet in his own country.

Forty years after he first tried, unsuccessfully, to persuade corporate America to pay attention to the principles of statistical quality control, the 82-year-old retired federal government statistician has suddenly come into enormous demand. Around the country, and for that matter around the world, Dr. Deming has emerged as the guru of a "Third Wave" of industrialization based on the realization that careful, informed control of the materials and processes of manufacturing is an essential element for any business that wants to survive in the global competition for today’s markets.

FLINT, Michigan–At 34, Dave Pasco is a big, barrel-chested man with a few streaks of grey in his jet black hair and beard. He lives with his wife and her three children in a comfortable home on Flint’s outskirts. When Pasco was 18--precisely on his birthday–he went to work at one of the eleven General Motors plants that are the bedrock of this city’s economy. The factory lured him from a department store, where hours were long and job security negligible. GM jobs paid better, offered more security and earlier retirement. To Pasco, it was big money and the American dream.

Pat Miller is a housewife. Alvin Green is a farmer. Martha Laird is a housewife. Salvatore Ganci is a former construction worker and Steven Sterling is a former carpenter. They live in the rich farmland of Michigan, the desolate high desert of Nevada, the modest suburbs of East Coast cities and the back country of Appalachia. They, and thousands of others throughout America, share a common experience: Unwittingly, they have been exposed to large doses of substances known to sicken and kill.