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Show U. WINS AND Y. LOSES | SUNDANCE WINNERS IN PARAGON’S WAKE | ‘Three Seasons’ topslist C-1 Lobos best Cougs, Utes fell UTEP B-1 Ex-clientsfaceliabilities E-1 CheS tLake Cribune ittp:/ /www.sltrib.com Utah's Independent Voice Since 1871 Volume 257 Number 109 © 1999, The Salt Lake Tribune 143 South MainStreet (801)237-2800 Salt LakeCity, Utah 84111 SUNDAY, JANUARY31, 1999 Loeee America Flush With Bowl Legends as Big Game Approaches BYTONYPERRY Los ES TIMES It happens every year: Super Bowl Sunday approacheth and super-sized things are said about the whopping impact on America wroughtby the football spectacular. The watersystemsof major cities arein peril of collapsing due to a thunderous amountof simultaneoustoilet flushing at halftime. It happened in Salt Lake City, you know. Moredrunken andloutish men beat up more women on this Sunday than any other day of the year. Shelters are swamped with calls. There’s a university study that provesit. The stock market will fluctuate up or down ing on whichleague is triumphant: AFC means a bear, NFCa bull. Ask your stockbro- that precede the Roman numeralized contest There's a problem. Disneyland is nearly depopulated. The line ‘h of these factoids is either an outright sity, sorta-true-but-sorta-false, or, as one of for the Matterhorn movesas briskly as a McDonald’s drive-through. The same for major golf courses; many foursomes just stroll on without reservations. And two-thirds those hoary old newspaper editors from long ago would haveit, too good not to be true whetherit happenedor not. eerHERE of www.sitrib.com Welcome to Super Bowl mythology, proof anewthat we Americans, despite our sophistication and cyberliteracy, arestill brothers to j all avocados are sold those superstitious ancients who painted their faces, howledat the moon and swapped legends about the power of certain days to cause portentousevents. “People need legends to keep their society within days of the Super Bowl as Americans prepare their guacamole for watching and munching parties. All interesting and culturally relevant stuff — interesting and relevant enough to launch many feature story during the days of hype See LEGENDS, Page A-11 Scandal Began In Birmingham Watching Naganoboosterslavish gifts on IOC taught Salt Lakers whatit takes to grasp rings BY FANTIN ‘BECCA WALSH © 1999, THE High-tech sponors wait out storm Gov. Norm Bangerter grasped the microphoneand told his colleagues to buck up. Salt Lake City had invested too muchin its Olympicquestto give up now. “He turnedit from a wakeinto a celePhoto courtesy of Great Basin Museum This circa 1940 photo showsVan's Hall during its heyday as a hoppingsocial club for Utah's westdesert region. Once Billy Van’s magical dancehall, it’s now. . . chosen to host the 1998 Winter Games. Utah, but this was one man’s vision andis THESALT LAKE TRIBUNE very exotic,” says Don Hartley, a preser- governor gave the trio specific instructions: Rein in Tom Welch He wasreferring to the man most re sponsible for Salt Lake's latest bid ef. fort, a lawyer who had dumpedhis day you talk to some of theold-timers, Billie Van's had a bit of a shady reputation. There were membersof the community It was a kaleidoscopic oa- upstairs to the dance floor was the first step off the straight and narrow.” It was named ‘Van's Even now, Hall” but everyonecalledit some30 yearsafter the last dance and lighted only by shafts of sunlight filtering through hazy rafter windows, the place remains otherworldly. believed that the bottom step leading records. sis of yellow, aquaand pink in the middle of the gray Utah desert. that Billie Van's after the dance hall’s owner and creator, the late Billie Van de Vanter, one of Delta's most colorful characters. Opened Andseemsto be calling out for the bandto play just one more song in 1934, the hall was a hub of social activity for decBillie Van de Vanter ades until it closed in the mid-1960s Now, many members of the communi. ty don’t even realize the second-floorrel- State experts are helping a handful of local residents to save Billie Van's, one of the most unusual dancehalls in Utah and perhaps the country ‘A dancehallitself is sort of unique in ic exists aboveanold auto-parts store on Delta's MainStreet. “Myfolks went there, and even in my probably wouldn't know about it,” says Millard County Sheriff Ed Phillips, a formerBillie Van's regular. “Boy, that place would get full up and the building would literally rock and roll, you ain't akidding.” Fortunately, the dancehall has weathered well during three decades of quiet solitude. Onlyrecently did theroofstart to leak, prompting the building's owner — Diane Chidester, Billie Van's grand. daughter — to contact the state about preserving the hall. Painted with tropical hues, the dance hall is decorated with an estimated 200,000 pieces of hand-cut mirror. The mirrors are gluedtothe walls andceiling 10C membershiswasthe best-prepared CLICK HERE hard way what it would take to grasp the Olympic rings While Salt Lakers were |. FOR MORE DETAILS i job to pursue the Olympicswith a single-minded passion bordering on obses- sion handing out cowboy hats and do-si-doing IOC members arounda hospitality roomfilled with pinetrees the Japanese were decorating delegates with jewelry, luggage and laptop com puters. Even moreastonishing were theac tions of Artur Takacs, an aide to 1OC When Atlanta upset Athens in 1990 in the race to host the 1996 Summer See SLOC, Page A-4 In Bangladesh, Women Who Say No Get Burned BY ULI SCHMETZER rored balls suspendedfromtheceiling ‘The room's centerpieceis a 400-pound rotating mirrored globe that hangs over the middle of the dance floor, covered See BILLIE VAN’S, Page A-6 CHICAGO TRIBUNE expresssuccess.com debuted last spring, created and maintained byCalifornia design firm Net/OL, But whenthealliance turne d sour, Net/OL designers faces of women whodaredto say noto menarehidden behinda swathof ban heavily sustained by international funding, has done little to stop jilted males from hurling sulfuric acid into the faces of women who offended their sense of machismo and their mis fered them economic independence and a chance to reject mar Web site expresssuccesssucks.com, Express Success, a network marketing company nesses targeted by “your-company-sucks" Web sites, including America Online, Wal-Mart, Toys RK Us, MeDonald's, Packard Bell and Bally Total Fitness. Other lost inhabitants. IW SUNDAY MAGA WEATHER Rain or snowlikely. THE ARTS Written in Utah, Going Somewhere INDEX “Thereare year,” noofficial statistics, but mutilations are record said plastic surgeon Samanta Lal Sen. Many cases are not madepublic be causethe girls are afraid to yo to the authorities or the case tled be tween families and the police,” he said Michael Miller/The Salt Lake Tribune David Holker of Express SuccessInc. wona legal victory when 8 federal judge orderedan antagonistic Website taken down. { ancient Mayan city and its long opens this week ed by the media in Bangladeshevery www.myboss.com, explores the | mysteries of an husbandas serfs, over 200 acid companies have found their managers roasted by em ployees at sites such as www.disgruntled.com and ot posalsin a society where wom traditionally passed from father to based in Utah County, joined a roster of unhappy busi- researcher rom Brigham Young University dages Bangladesh, an impoverishednation with a new thrust by women in Bangla: desh toassert their rights. The women had help from micro-credits that of. John Perez and Keith Getic announced their gripes about Express Success to the world — via renegade x DHAKA, Bangladesh — In a burn ward crowded with rusty cots and blood-stained linen, the acid-ravaged guided credo that men have rights over women. The wave of acid-throwing began about seven years ago and coincided Express Success Inc. figured a corporate Website would boost its profile with potential customers, So See COMPLAINT, Page A-9 Bangerter and then-Salt Lake City Mayor Palmer DePaulis say the former madechandeliers and eight small, mir- BY SHEILA R. MeCANN ‘THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE negotiate with grumbling customers first place. Then heproceeded to show in intricate patterns and adorn thehand. ‘Smear Campaign’ Web Site Shut Down, But Others Flourish Such complaint sites arerelatively new but spreading fast, said James Alexander of WavePhoreIne,, a com pany in Phoenix that offers eWatch, an Internet moni toring service to corporations. Headvises companies to post their sideof a dispute onan official Website and sports wonderland — the mission that had convinced the U.S. Olympic Com mittee to promote Salt Lake City in the Welch, bid-committee Vice President Dave Johnson and their fellow Olympic boosters for Birmingham. It was there that organizers learned the Two sources close to would suspect anybody 40 or younger team’s pledge to develop a winter ing Birmingham, England. The other wasdirected at Salt Lake City business- generationit wasstill a hot spot, but I was reveille. He trotted out the bid city to host the world But nothing could have prepared BY CHRISTOPHER SMITH vation architect with the Utah Historical Society, which awarded a $4,500 grant toward a $21,000 roof-repair job. “If Games, most people considered it a toe tag for Salt Lake City’s bid. To Welch, it It was one of two post-mortem pep talks Bangerter wouldgive before leav- A Place Out of Time melted 78-rpm phonograph | bration,” Fred Ball recalls of that night in June 1991 after Nagano, Japan, was men Spencer Eccles, Frank Joklik and Verl Topham. DELTA — They used to dance the light fantastic at Billie Van's. Hundreds of couples swirled beneath reflections from many tiny mirrors, shuffling across a gleaming floor made of —A-5 SALT LAKE TRIBUNE The case of Ambia Khatun is typi cal, She recalls it was shortly before Page A-9 “TheJoy of Definite” Page D-1 Ann Landers. 42 Obituaries Book Reviews D5 PersonaiAds. Classified Ads. FQ Purrles Crossword F19, 52 Lottery c2 Movies. DS C10 J6 A Real Estate A aret Fie Word News a LAU 34945 02345 ' See IN BANGLADESH, Page A-3 , . |