From Wire Service Reports
HOUSTON - Howard Hughes,
one-time playboy pilot who became
a recluse billionaire, died yesterday
in an airplane hurrying him from
Acapulco to Houston for medical
treatment, Methodist Hospital an-
nounced. He was 70.
The Hughes saga that had mys-
tified the world for two decades
ended in a brief announcement by
a spokesperson for the hospital,
which had been Hughes' destina-
tion when he was overtaken in the
air by death.
"TODAY AT 1:27 P.M. (CST) en
route from Acapulco to Houston,
Mr. Howard Hughes expired."
And it ended in more mystery
-the hospital said it didn't know
the cause of death and didn't know
what to do with Hughes' body be-
cause no instructions had been re-
ceived.
But is Los Angeles, an attorney who
said he had represented Hughes for 25
years said the billionaire died of a
stroke. The attorney, Greg Bautzer, re-
fused to identify his source.
HOSPITAL VICE PRESIDENT Larry
9hes
Mathis said the hospital learned about 9
a.m. that Hughes was coming to Hous-
ton for treatment. A medical team in an
unmarked ambulance met the jet when
it landed at Houston Intercontinental
Airport about 2 a.m., but Hughes was al-
ready dead, Mathis said.
Shortly before the plane landed, its
crew alerted airport officials to get
ready "to service a bed patient in a dia-
betic coma," U. S. Customs spokesman
Charles Conroy said.
Copilot Jeff Abrams said Hughes look-
ed "like a tired, worn-out old person"
when he was carried aboard the plane
on a stretcher.
dead
PILOT ROGER SUTTON described
Hughes as "very wasted" and "very,
very pale." Sutton said Hughes had a
thin beard and long, greyish hair.
"He moved his lips a little bit when
they put him on the plane, but I couldn't
hear anything," said Sutton.
In Beverly Hills, Calif., Hughes' sec-
ond wife, actress Jean Peters, said sim-
ply, "I'm sorry; I'm saddened" upon
learning of Hughes' death. She divorced
Hughes in 1971, after 14 years of mar-
riage.
HUGHES REPORTEDLY had lived at
the Acapulco Princess Hotel in the Mex-
ican seacoast resort since early Febru-
r'- i
,.
.
.
ary. Since 1970, he had lived in a series
of tightly guarded hotel suites in North
American, the Bahamas and London.
Hughes was a man of many passions
- for power, perfection, pretty faces and
fast planes. But his greatest passion was
for privacy.
Since 1948, he played cat-and-mouse
with the press and public, defying de-
mands by the govarnment to appear in
public at a cost of millions of dollars.
HIS ROLE AS recluse at the end of his
life was a turnabout from his early years
when he was Page One news - directing
film actresses and marrying them, build-
See HOWARD, Page 10
atti
Hughes
MSA
ENDORSEMENTS
See Editorial Page
Y
Sir& iga
SUNNY
High-59T
Low--28°
See Today for details
Latest Deadline in the State
Vol. LXXXVI, No. 152
Ann Arbor, Michigan-Tuesday, April 6, 1976
10 Cents
Ten Pages
Allen
slips
by
Rowr y,
Republicans
control
Council;
voters
throw
out
Py
Kenworthy, Belcher win;
SHRP loses Council seat
Daily Photo by PAULINE LUBENS
Roger Bertoia (R-Third Ward) and Wendell Allen (R-First Ward) congratulate
each other on their respective victories in last night's city council races. Allen
is the first Republican to win a Council seat in his ward since 1960.
Doily Photo by STEVE KAGAN
DEMOCRATIC COUNCIL winners Jamie Kenworthy (Ward 4) and Earl Greene
(Ward 2) celebrate their victory last night at the Rubaiyat. Said Kenworthy,
"Well Greene, you and I have to live together."
Republican Wendell Allen, cash-
ing in on a miserable voter turnout
in the city's heavily Democratic
First Ward, slipped through to vic-
tory in yesterday's City Council
elections. At the same time, city
voters overwhelmingly repealed the
controversial preferential voting
(PV) system, and brought to an
apparent end the dwindling clout
of its architects, the Socialist Hu-
man Rights Party (SHRP).
Allen, a 28-year-old black stock-
broker who becomes the first Re-
publican to capture the student-
heavy ward since 1960, edged out
Democrat Ezra Rowry by 117 votes.
His victory once again hands the
GOP a 6-5 margin on Council, an
edge they held two years ago.
IN OTHER RACES, Democrat Jamie
Kenworthy retained his Fourth Ward
seat against a stiff challenge from Re-
publican Mary Lou Slater, hanging on
by 214 votes; Democrat Earl Greene
handily put away the Second Ward race
against Republican James Reynolds,
whose visability during this campaign
was comparable to that of Judge Cra-
ter' s.
Incumbent Roger Bertoia, as expect-
ed, trampled Third Ward Democratic
hopeful Martin Black by more than 2,000
votes; and Louis Belcher, Republican
incumbent from the Fifth Ward, was
comfortably returned to office over
Democrat Judith Hanks by nearly 1,000
votes,dwith absentee ballots yet to be
counted.
For SHRP, it was their bleakest elec-
tion night in their four-year history.
Their four Council candidates, Diane
Autin (a First Ward write-in), Thomas
Owen (the First ward candidate declar-
ed ineligible), Diane Kohn (Second
Ward), Madelyn Elder (Fourth Ward)
failed to scratch up 1,000 votes between
them. Completely shut out from Council
for the first time since 1972, the party's
future in Ann Arbor has apparently
lapsed from dubious to terminal.
IN THE OTHER two ballot issues, A
and C, door-to-door voter registration
survived by a margin of approximate-
See REPUBLICANS, Page 3
SHRPfail
comeback
By DAVID WHITING
Daily News Analysis
Some said they were doomed from the
start, but in 1972 the fledgling radical
Human Rights Party managed to over-
come the odds in their first election
and seat two of their members on City
Council.
However, as yesterday's election re-
sults came in, the odds were played
out. Four years of rocky existence on
City Council have come to an end for
.he torn and tattered leftist organization,
recently renamed the Socialist Human
Rights Party (SHRP).
AFTER LOSING their one remaining
Council seat in the Second Ward last
night, defeated SHRP First Ward can-
didate Diane Autin said, "Most people
in SHRPihave already decided not to
participate in electoral politics. All of
us are still very active. We're just into
a lot of things we think are more im-
portant than elections."
Since SHRP's heyday in 1972-73, when
they held the swing votes on a liberal
See SHRP, Page 3
30,000 PROTEST RADICAL CAMPAIGN
Chinese
revolt
quelled
By AP and Reuter
PEKING-Workers' militia arm-
ed with wooden staves last night
took control of Peking's vast Tien
An Men Square after a day of vio-
lent demonstrations.
The square was cleared of crowds
and long, orderly lines of militia
were seen escorting people, appar-
ently demonstrators, through the
walls into the ancient Forbidden
City.
EARLIER, PEKING MAYOR Mu Teh
broadcast through loudspeakers to the
crowd, appealing to them to disperse
after the most violent scenes the capital.
has witnessed since the tumultuous Cul-
tural Revolution a decade ago.
Cars were set afire and demonstrators,
estimated to number 30,000, tried unsuc-
cessfully to burn down a building in a
Class GPA may
go on transcripts
protest that clearly reflected the politi-
cal power struggle in the Chinese leader-
ship.
Late last night, the militia appeared to
have quelled any opposition.
LIGHTS WERE still burning in the
Great Hall of the People', a sign that a
large-scale meeting might be under way.
The protest appeared to have been
triggered off by the removal overnight
of thousands of paper wreaths laid
around the Martyrs' Monument in tri-
bute to the late Premier Chou En-Lai.
Mayor Wu Teh's words echoed from
loudspeakers lined around the square. He
blamed "a small minority of ambitious,
evil men" for the day-long protests that
had produced the violence.
HE LINKED the demonstrations to a
struggle in the Chinese leadership which
had developed after the death of Pre-
mier Chou En-Lai last January.
The mayor said the riots were aimed
at Chairman Mao Tse-Tung and the Cen-
tral Committee of the Communist Party.
Behind the violence, he said, were men
who supported the "capitalist road" -
meaning Vice Premier Teng Hsiao-Ping,
the main target of the anti-rightiest cam-
paign.
Temp hb~art hne, exnrtpdr to- !,i,red
Chaos aids PY
By MAUREEN NOLAN
Literary school (LSA) faculty members
dealt a potentially severe blow to "grade
inflation" yesterday by approving a
change in the Faculty Cede that calls for
inclusion of class average grades on stu-
dent transcripts.
The proposal passed by a narrow mar-
gin at the monthly faculty meeting.
Chou began last Friday as part of the
annual Ching Ming festival to pay re-
spects to the dead.
As many as 70,000 people poured into
Tien An Men Square on Sunday to pile
wreaths, banner and flowers dedicated
to Chou before the Martyrs' Monument
in the center.
Japanese reports said although militia-
See CHINA, Page 10
for example-might show up as nothing
more than the class average.
THE IMPLICATIONS of the change
are speculative, but supporters hope it
will lead to a more discriminate assign-
ment of high grades, thus cutting down
on grade inflation.
"My guess is that the faculty will
become more aware of the clustering of
grades into the upper regions," said
By JAY LEVIN
and DAVID WHITING
Daily News Analysis
City voters reacted to the confusion
of last year's mayoral election yester-
day, and repealed preferential voting
(PV) for mayor-a process which they
had approved only 17 months ago.
Casting partisan lines aside, voters
who did away with the Democratic en-
dorsed PV also approved the liberally-
sponsored door-to-door voter registra-
tion advisory ballot issue.
last year's election cost the city some
$80,000-twice the normal figure.
Confusion, probably more than any-
thing else, contributed to the voters'
decision to remove PV from the books.
Last year, Democratic Mayor Albert
Wheeler was not seated until May-a
month after the election. Adding to the
chaos, election workers had bungled
the handling of boxes containing the
ballots and city Republicans contended
the constitutionality of the voting sys-
tem.
repeal
did not entice student voters to cast
ballots against the measure or to vote
at all.
It appears that many voters feel that
PV will be unnecessary in the future
with the disappearance of SHRP, the
city's only third party.
LIKE THE repeal of PV, voters split
from traditional party lines when de-
ciding on the passage of the Democratic
sponsored door-to-door voter registra-
tion proposal. Voters in the staunchly-
Republican Third and Fifth Wards turn-