University of Texas School of Law - Peregrinus Yearbook (Austin, TX)

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Summer Mired in Oil The gas crunch of Ihe spring eased with better distribution plans, but a surplus of oil from a well blowout off the coast of Mexico, formed a slick which turned Texas' best beaches into a quagmire of tar residue. The drilling company. SEDCO. happened to be owned by Texas Governor Bill Clements, and he quickly found a new sparring partner in Democratic Attorney General Mark White. Interest rates on home mortgage loans reached all-time highs. Peter Flawn took over the reigns of The University of Texas at Austin from a retiring Lorene Rogers, and roller skates were in — be it for the transportation or disco-ing. The Year in Brief —13

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Spring Fallout Portends Problems The Spring of 1979 saw the overthrow and exile of the Shah of Iran, a frightening accident at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant and long gas lines in certain areas, like California. Dallas, and the petroleum center itself, Houston. Despite the Three Mile Island mishap less than two weeks before an Austin vote on whether to remain a part of the South Texas Nuclear Project or pull out. the vote to remain in was convincing. The first Republican governor since Reconstruction sparred with the Texas Legislature, and a last ditch effort by a group of liberal Texas Legislators known as the Killer Bees failed to prevent the passage of legislation weakening the Texas Consumer Protection Act. While the Shah lingered in Egypt, a fanatical Ayatolluh Khomeini took power in Iran, where internal chaos threatened petroleum exports and world peace. 12 — Tlur Year ill Brief

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A Gentle Autumn Ends Abruptly A relatively peaceful autumn with football in the spotlight, was disrupted with a storming of the IJ.S. Embassy in Tehran, violent demonstrations at the IJ.S. Embassies in Libya and Pakistan, and a daring and bloody assassination attack in the Holy Mosque in Mecca. The entry of the former Shah into the U.S. for medical treatment provoked an attack by Iranian students, who demanded the return of the Shah in exchange for the fifty hostages seized by the students. Moslem dissidents raided the Mosque, apparently in an attempt to assassinate King Khalid. who normally worships there. News of the desecration incited the attacks on the other embassies, as Moslem radicals presumed the U.S. was to blame. 14 — The Year in Brief