Letters to the editor Jan. 15

'Let's go visit the prison!'

The year, 1946 - a warm, sunny day in Carson.

My friend Sylvia Ranney and I had time on our hands. Very little activity in Carson City in the '40s.

Sylvia lived on East Fifth Street; thr prison was just down the road.

I said, "Let's go visit the prison!" We had heard and read about the woolly mammoth footprints in a cave at the prison. So we decided to walk to the prison and ask if we could see the old footprints.

We walked about a mile to the gate, went in and knocked on the door. It opened and we asked the guard if he could show us the mammoth footprints. He said sure.

He called another guard - a big man in a uniform - and he took us out through the prison yard.

"Stay close," he said. "These guys aren't here for going to Sunday School!"

We walked farther and came to a cave with a fence around it. He opened the gate and took us into the dark cave. Sure enough, there were many big footprints in the stones of the cave. The woolly mammoth had been in Carson thousands of years ago.

After we looked around for a minute, the guard took us back out through the exercise yard (the men were watching us) and to the office. We thanked him, said goodbye, and walked back to Sylvia's house.

What an interesting adventure on a boring, hot day in Carson City, 1946.

SUSAN SHEDD SCHROEDER

Carson City

Stop throwing tax dollars at higher ed

With surgical precision, Ron Knecht cuts right through the biased and deceitful funding findings of the Brookings Institute.

Many perceive that organization to be infallible and not to be questioned. Regent Knecht has clearly shown facts as to why our higher education program is not underfunded.

I have always felt that the per-student measure is one of the most appropriate measures and by that standard, Nevada's higher education is practically at the national average.

As to faculty pay, our educators are very well paid in relation to the economic environment. Not that many other business people are making six-figure incomes. Per Knecht's article, our educators are paid 25 percent above market.

I strongly believe our state's tax system should not be further stressed by those who might believe the solution is to throw more tax dollars at higher education.

Carol Bauer

Dayton

People can't get back to work if there are no jobs

While I agree with a fairly substantial amount of Guy Farmer's columns, I was rather appalled at the very end of his New Year's Day column about how they should "get a job."

To him, regarding that column (and anybody else who is lucky enough to have not only a job, but job security) who has the audacity to assume that everybody receiving freebies is due to them not having a job, I say this.

Maybe these people wouldn't be protesting at all if they, too, didn't have to worry about such things as, oh, I don't know, imminent homelessness. One can't exactly force somebody to give them a job, now can one? Why, no.

So, all that any of us in such a state can do is keep on applying multiple times at the same places and hope this time they'll be selected, kind of like the lottery, when after over a year or two, it's like beating a dead horse or begging.

And why can't we all just get a job, which I'm quite sure the majority of the freebie receivers would much rather do than receive the freebies?

It's because a large chunk of jobs which those of us not blessed with abilities to have careers, but who'd be happy to have these entry-level peon-work jobs, aren't in this country - they're outsourced. And then, all us unfortunates have to turn around and buy their products back because we can't afford to shop other places.

Lynnea Malone

Carson City

Some questions about Nevada's Mustangs

Being somewhat of an animal oriented person, I have watched all this horse business for about 30 years.

It is obvious to the fence posts that may now keep them away from the water afforded them by their creator (AB329-2011), that the so-called Mustangs are long gone. This has a tendency to mitigate the tradition and heritage idea also.

The Mustangs have been replaced, in part, with animals that mamas and daddies bought for their offspring who found out that these horses interfered with the use of all the other cool things that they have.

Things that eat, require a lot of unglamorous work, so they may have been set free to become part of our heritage or whatever.

Of course, some were just plain dumped like unwanted dogs and cats are.

Questions:

Is it the BLM that is killing the horses, or is it our meat-based diet?

If anyone, including protesters, eat meat, are they killing horses of any standing?

Is there more of a market for meat than wild horses?

If people are more important than animals, to whom or what are they more important?

Another victim of all this is the charm and romance associated with the cowboys involved, who, by the way, handle all meat animals in much the same way.

Pete Bachstadt

Carson City

If you don't like it here in the Silver State, leave

I was born in Southern California on the outskirts of Los Angeles in 1939, and lived most of my life there. Now I realize Nevada is a little behind times, but businesses were coming here until the recession started because Nevada didn't tax them to death.

Also, why are big corporations moving their companies overseas instead of in the states?

Nevada isn't the only mining and gambling state. People in every state are whining about jobs, welfare, and are fed up with illegals getting everything.

So, Paxton Lee, from your letter in the paper, I would say you are from California or another state you left because you didn't like the laws, and now, you want to change Nevada to the way it was where you came from. I don't see you really giving any ideas as to what to do, just running Nevada down.

I've been here 30 years, and I love it, and I hope things pick up. I suggest that if the reasons you put in your letter bother you so much, move. We don't want everything covered with cement pavement. We like trying to keep Nevada on the country side.

Paxton Lee, just what kind of image is Nevada supposed to project to the corporate world so they'll come here and have a solid line of Fortune 500 companies churning out products for wonderful Californians to consume?

Carol Grows

Carson City