Front Street Weekly; 522

[music] Abortion it's an emotional issue. The pro-choice and the pro-life activists are standing firm in increasing numbers all over the country. Locally the two sides are facing off at the site of a clinic in Forest Grove Oregon where a large percentage of this state's abortions are performed. And you'll meet Pietro Balluschi one of America's most respected architects. And if you're able to walk you can dance, that's how one ballroom dance instructor persuades people to kick up their heels.

You'll see those stories tonight on Front Street Weekly, Oregon Public Television's news magazine. Good evening. I'm Gwyneth Gamble Booth I'm Jim Swenson and welcome back after a week's absence. In 1985, four bombs were pulled from the U.S. mail in Oregon. They were addressed to abortion clinics in Portland and to one clinic in Forest Grove. Abortion is legal in the United States, millions are performed each year in 1984 over 13,000 abortions were performed in Oregon. But legal or not, there are still many who feel that abortion is wrong and they're making their views known any way that they can. Tonight we'll see how the abortion issue is being dealt with in the rural community of Forest Grove. Kaja Zaloudek reports [protesting] Stop crucifying babies, they're human beings too! [protesting] Abortions have been performed under the law in the United States for 13 years now. But what used to be a very private matter between a woman and her doctor has recently caused an

increased amount of protest and even violence. The anti-abortionists and the pro-choice activists continue to stand toe to toe in communities where abortions are being performed. For several years, clinics in larger cities like Portland have been the targets of pickets and demonstrations but in small rural communities. Conflict exists as well. I have a problem with the slaughter of innocent lives as a as a source of income for a physician and I cannot I cannot call a man who makes a living on the lives of unborn children. a physician at all. What do you call him a murderer. Two days a week, Dr. Peter Bours performs abortions in his family practice clinic here in Forest Grove. On those same two days, members of Catholics United for Life and women for the protection of the innocent gather as what they call sidewalk counselors actively

protesting what they feel is the murder of over 1000 innocent babies a year here at Bour's clinic. [protesting] [protesting] Unborn babies are being killed. And we are standing out here to. let abbortionist Bors and. His patrons and the community know that we disagree in the practice of abortion. I don't really care what anyone's feelings are about abortion. I just that to me, the basic issue - I mean I do care but in terms of my relations with the community I just think the basic issue is do I have the right to carry on my business and to stay in practice in the face of a rather organized attack by a group of people that clearly want to put me out of business. We don't wish for his practice to fold up or anything but we do want This practice of abortion to stop

But Dr. Bours says he will not stop performing abortions. He's been providing what he calls a needed service here in Forest Grove since 1977. Until a couple of years ago Dr. Bours kept a low profile about his abortion practice. It was really well hidden, his abortion practice was really well hidden. It wasn't till we went out there that it got brought to the light, I mean that parking lot was full of people all the time. And by the time that the picketing and protesting was done and what was really going on there was brought into the community. it got to be a pretty empty parking lot. It wasn't widely known in this community that I was performing abortions in my office because I mean I never attracted a lot of attention and I never advertise that fact. My notoriety as it were ever was really brought on by their targeting me. Shortly after the counselors started showing up on the sidewalk, there were two arson attacks on the clinic. Death threats to Dr Bours and his staff and most recently an

attempted mail bomb in December of 1985. Keeping a low profile wasn't working so Bors felt the time had come to speak out publicly on the pro-choice side. Well, one it became impossible to keep a low profile. You can't keep a low profile when people are sending bombs to you. And two, I guess I feel there's some safety and personally think there's some safety in speaking out and taking a stance and I really don't want to I just think that the right for women to choose is too important and let it be overrun by a small group of fanatics. The people that are really out there are causing all the trouble clearly represent a very small percentage of the population, even of a town like this where there's such a high concentration of churches and religious groups. So with each side standing firm a line has been clearly drawn. To try and stop Dr. Bors from performing abortions. The anti-abortionists are making themselves difficult

to ignore. [protesting in background] This demonstration held last January at the clinic on the anniversary of the legalization of abortion in the United States was countered by pro-choice activists. [protesting] Aborting an embryo or a fetus, we are aborting another part of the human family. On a regular basis. Pro-life sidewalk counselors try to show women alternatives to abortion. First of all to have the opportunity to intercede on the baby's behalf and give the women the alternatives that we don't believe they're being given, the facts that what they carry is not a blob of fetal conception, that they are carrying a child and that that child will live if they were given the opportunity. I certainly consider myself the counselor in this area. I spend a lot of time counseling people about options. I think the the real key to any effective counseling and I think that is what you're trying to do is help them

figure out what is right for them. And not only do the counselors talk to women planning abortions but tell women coming to Bors for obstetrical care that he is killing babies. Well my feeling is that there has been a horrible amount of demonstration there and that there has been some kind of a movement to terrorize all the people going into Peter Bours' clinic. Whether they're going there to have an abortion, whether they're going there to have a baby as I was last year and was terrorized by demonstrators who were screaming at me and my 5 year old son as we went into the clinic. Many on the pro-choice side disagree with the counselors' tactics. What I really disagree with them is a fact they think they can impose their moral viewpoint legally by law on all the rest of the country. And to me, that's where they really are wrong. There is this urgency in these people, this fanaticism, to

try to demand that everyone see things their way and share their opinion. What they're trying to do is. Instill guilt and confusion in these women and not counsel them at all. How can they call themselves sidewalk counselors? It's just a euphemism there. They're picketers, they're harassers. Beverly Burke sees the protesting as an invasion of privacy. In the real basis of that issue is that an abortion decision is a medical decision which a woman or a woman has medical confidentiality. It is a spiritual decision which is a inner feeling decision between a woman and herself. What it means to her to have A, gotten pregnant and B, decide what she's going to do with it.

But while some are angry at the interference and the invasion of privacy, others accept the words of the pro-life counselors in those cases where women are talked out of having an abortion at Bour's clinic. They're often taken to see pro-life Doctor James Seriakoff, an osteopathic physician here in Forest Grove. Obviously they're here because they're contemplating changing their mind about abortion. And and so we talk about the baby. We talk about the baby, we listen to the baby's heartbeat. In terms of my my personal persuasion abilities and persuading a lady not to have an abortion, I'm not very successful at all. you know and I and I and I wished I were I was somebody were very successful. But we do see some ladies change their mind once in a while. Since they've been out on the sidewalk, The counselors say they've talked 30 women out of having abortions at the clinic. Maureen Frye was one. She went to Dr Bour's for an abortion over a year ago. At age 21 with three children already and two abortions behind her she didn't want to be pregnant again. But Maureen changed her mind. She had a baby boy in

December of 1985 and now thinks abortion is wrong. I knew that what I was doing was wrong. Whereas I think that before when I had had an abortion before and I actually went through with the abortion, I didn't know what I was doing. It was a place where you know it was. Quote OK in the world the world says this is OK if you want to have an abortion, do it. You know this is your choice and God doesn't say that. But for the 1000 women who didn't listen they pray. They would be forgiving. I just know Father that Satan has used this place as a place of condemnation not only of children's lives but mothers' lives I think it's fine for them to protest, I just wish they would watch what they say a little bit. In response to the acts of violence against clinics in Oregon and across the country.

Dr. Bor spoke to the National Abortion Rights Action League last January in Washington D.C. The pro-abortion that people might be trying to make Dr. Bors into something that he might not be but they're trying to maybe hold him up as an example or something. And so that might be one of the reasons why it's so hotly contested here. On a local level Bours is trying to stop a ballot proposal which would eliminate state-funded abortions. He also wants to hold down the activities of the protesters in front of his clinic. I certainly agree that we're never going to get rid of them but maybe we could bring it down to some kind of peaceful coexistence. What I would really like to see as far - personally - as far as Peter Bours is concerned, and I prayed many times, God, make him a pro-life doctor. The conflict over abortion has been going on for years and it resurfaces in force every year on the anniversary of its legalization and some feel that Oregon's current problems are as a result of this being an election year.

And the fact that we have at one of our major candidates has taken a strong stand continually on abortion. That's right. Really volatile. Well, Pietro Belluschi. He's one of America's most respected architects and his multifaceted career spans years of design success. He was dean of the MIT School of Architecture and planning. And in 1972, he won the American Institute of Architects gold medal. Just one of his many honors. Belluschi's imprimatur can be seen on such diverse projects ranging from the Pan Am building in New York to the Air Force Academy in Colorado. [music] In the field of architecture Pietro Baluschi is a monolith.

His genius is internationally recognized and his influence on architecture is felt worldwide. We visited this charming man in a house he designed for a client 40 years ago. Constructed on a cliff in northwest Portland. The elegant wood structure is now owned by Baluschi and his wife Marge. Still active in 86, Belluschi exudes a quiet wisdom about his profession. Architecture is probably the Most basic of our human. Activities or exercises because it means being protected from the rigor of nature. And in the process you express your most intimate feelings about how you want to live. As a young man from Italy, Belluschi was fascinated by the Oregon countryside.

No it scared me, I didn't like it at first was too wild and too scary. My point. Has been that coming to Oregon. which is so different from say the landscape in Tuscany or in Italy. That I was more aware than the people born here about. The difference in the potential and feeling of woods, the wildness of Oregon's Landscape and nature so that my impression was more vivid, more differentiated, and therefore stronger. His love of nature is reflected in the structures he created, often of wood. He sees nature as integral to man's most pressing needs. Well it's the very to the very core of that location and frankly, with the design of buildings just to create a work of art to design a building for a purpose. Number one. Number two, you have to pay respect to what's around, the scale.

The character. The people. Belluschi's designs range from single family homes to shimmering churches and major private and public buildings. His 1931 design for the Portland Art Museum was recognized as among the 100 best buildings of that period by the American Institute of Architects. He also designed the Alice Tully Hall and the Juilliard School of Music and much much more. Saint Thomas Moore was your first church here in Portland wasn't it. Yes. What did you think of it as you put your pencil to the-? well I was worried how you could build anything for 17,000 dollars. For 17,000 dollars? That was the main worry And so that forced me to to go to this, to the basic of it and have just simply all the structure exposed wood exposed. But then it would become

much more. Rare the importance of having. The lighting come from the right place. The proportion the right one and the height and all the things that make an environment without fear or to be concerned to make it very rich you don't use fancy marble, fancy carving fancy or gothic details, just go down to basics and therefore it has that quality. I would say sincere quality of having met the problem but doing a church for I think was 300 people, whatever it was at the time, for 17000 dollars total People don't realize how much of it. Discipline cost imposes Portlanders Lano Lencick and Gideon Bhaskar collaborated recently on a history of Portland architecture for

Western imprints. The publishing arm of the Oregon Historical Society Titled frozen music, this beautiful book's preface was written by Pietro Belluschi. The authors told us why they asked him. His word should stand at the beginning of a book which tries to explore Portland architecture from a multiplicity of viewpoints. Bosker and Lencek used Portland as a metaphor. They see the city as a microcosm of architectural styles. A museum of architecture, if you will. I think Pietro Belluschi would be found, his work I Put in both Of the old masters and a modernist. I think when discussing Beluschi it's important to realize that really he transcends labels of any kind and I think he would say so himself. I think the reason for that is that he always resorts to first principles when he Sort of an elegant simplicity when he conceives his architecture and when he discusses

it. But architecture is so much more than the building of buildings, Said Belluschi, The natural light is the one that provides the visual experience forever. succession of of moods as the sun. Moves from one part of the sky to the other. There is no certainty anywhere in nature and nature is a series of. Experiencesand there's a ray of hope for you if you are well motivated, the results will be satisfactory and there's no guarantee that it will be unless. There is that spiritual that bright equality that is part of the architecture. Real. Work otherwise you'd be a builder not an architect. Beluschi's Buildings are expressions of their own time. But like their creator they are

timeless. His grace and dignity of style respect the spiritual nature of mankind. His work quite simply. Will endure. He continues to be actively involved with architecture one of his current projects is the chapel at the University of Portland which is now under construction. And in March 1986 Baluschi received the governor's arts award that recognizes people who have made significant contributions in the field of cultural life. Certainly he has done that and totally appropriate to Oregon just great. speaking of significant contributions we have a bit of a history lesson for you right now. The 15th century was the age of Joan of Arc Leonardo DaVinci Christopher Columbus and yes ballroom dancing in the 1400s for the first time men and women danced together in the palaces of France and Italy's aristocracies

Well before long social dancing had spread to the middle class and reporter Hope Robertson tells us the 500 year old art form is still with us in a world all of its own It's a different world out there on the floor. A world of long flowing gowns of rhinestones and sequins a world of tales and ties. Of glitter flash. Maybe a little elegance. It's the world of ballroom dancing. Dancers and dancers to be from all over the Northwest gather Oregon Washington Canada all have made the trip to Seattle for this dance competition and for their share of the spotlight. Everybody has their dream of being a star a prince charming a Snow White or a princess or something and we all have those dreams a

lot of people are just afraid to try it. I think dancing has always been around just got lost in the shuffle 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 try not to look down that's where you're going off balance Before he came to Oregon 13 years ago. Ramos Reynoso was a dance instructor in Chicago. Among those he taught were blind deaf and other handicapped children. When he entered them in dance competitions Reynoso says no one knew that some of the students were blind until they went to pick up their trophies using canes to walk. most people don't think ballroom dancing because. Anybody can dance. If they're not afraid. Older people say well that's just for young people. I look at Mrs. Pierce she's 85 and she's still doing that. Yeah. I mean did you start when you were a kid Oh no I didn't start. my husband and I didn't start It was 58. All right

I just wanted to watch her. for 85 she really moves 85 she is a doll come on Marie well one thing about it when I was younger I wanted to get into dancing and wished my parents would have given me dancing lessons But with seven children in the family you don't always get what you want. And so therefore I didn't but my mother did teach me. Ballroom dancing square dancing and the rest of it so that we had fun at home. And. Went to dances But then. I just never did take any professional instruction. Until. Two years ago. I would like to be able to go out Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday night dancing. But. Where do

you go. I'm single. and It's just hard to try and find single people single men to dance with. There aren't that many that are. Single people single men dancing Ronnie dance the rumba Although men take lessons too they're outnumbered by women students. So why spend all that time learning new steps and practicing them. If you can't find a suitable dance partner. The answer for Doreen and many others is competition. a dance showcase like this one gives even novice dancers a sense of accomplishment. panel of judges lets them know how well they're performing each dance step. First place goes to the

ones who execute their chosen routines correctly. A second place award means you need some work. There is no third place. The students dance with their teacher but only the student's work is graded. Just because your Foxtrot isn't up against someone else's foxtrot that doesn't mean students are any less nervous. I'm dead serious. You do things like put Vaseline on your teeth because you get so cotton mouth that your lips if you get a smile on your face your lips will actually stick and you can't get your mouth shut. It's awful. It's a terrible feeling it's just nerves just stage fright. I've been told by people you're just trying to relive your youth you know well. Maybe inside you are I don't know I don't feel that way but. I suppose there's an. Elegance about it. You can see a fantasy world a dream Come true it's a very elegant

Well you might want to keep your eyes open for dance competitions and showcases coming up in this area later this month. A company will hold a showcase of ballroom dance at the Reynoso School of Dance in Portland that we saw in this piece holds its exhibition in August so Gwyneth get your dancing shoes on. OK Arthur Murray I bet you've got a pretty mean figure on the dance floor. Well here's what you're going to be seeing on the next edition of Front Street weekly logging and fishing. Can they coexist under Oregon's forestry laws. Some environmentalists say no but the State Department of Forestry disagrees acceptance of interracial marriages is growing but mixed couples still risk society's disapproval. And Portland boasts many fine art galleries one particularly zany off the wall salon. Well that's our program for this evening. We'll be here next week. We hope to see you then good night Good night.