I am still in rehab as a result of attending the Crescent Valley High School commencement. It's tough, but I'll make it.

The fact that I am 87(CE) really does not make me an old grouch. (That is for many people in their 90s). I just draw a line as to acceptable and non-acceptable behavior that is different than many other people.

The yelling and screaming was unnerving, and the guy with the pressurized can with a horn attached was especially annoying - and not only to me.

After all these years of conducting a commencement, I would think the installation of a first-class PA system would be a must. I dislike attending an event that has a PA system that squeaks, belches, squeals and refuses to allow many attendees to hear the speakers.

To hear the young speakers was very important to me, but that did not happen.

To all you CVHS grads: May you enjoy the many good things in life and be resolute in overcoming the nasties that crop up through the years. And they do crop up; believe me.

Hank Herdt

Corvallis

Large new student condos lack parking

I'm writing regarding Mona Matlock's June 18 letter, "Don't let condos define Corvallis."

I wholeheartedly agree that historic Corvallis neighborhoods are losing out to the profit motive of developers.

Over the last few years, I have watched several large multi-student housing and condominium structures go up in the area north of Oregon State University, where we live. They are primarily replacing single-family homes.

Although these units may provide the needed bedrooms for OSU's expanding student population, they do not provide an adequate number of off-street parking spaces.

In an ideal world, all these students would leave their cars at home, biking, walking and taking the bus to campus. But that is as realistic as as the city requiring developers to provide such minimal on-site parking.

Parking already was an issue in this part of town before the student condo boom hit the area; now it is even worse.

If Corvallis wishes to maintain a healthy, vibrant core, the city needs to re-examine the codes that allow developers to squeeze such oversized units onto such small lots, which seem to maximize the number of bedrooms while compromising the parking needs of both these newer units and existing neighborhoods.

New development should contribute to the livability of the community, not create additional problems.

Karin Krakauer

Corvallis

Letter about Islam distorted the truth

Dan Conway's June 17 letter, tracing the history of Islam, appeared in the June 17 Gazette-Times. Unfortunately, Mr. Conway's history was extremely negative and, thus, also extremely distorted.

He does not mention, for example, that during Europe's Dark Ages, the great Greco-Roman intellectual heritage probably would have been lost if it had not been for the Islamic civilization.

As historian Will Durant reported, "For five centuries, from 700 to 1200, Islam led the world in power, order, and extent of government … (as well as) in literature, scholarship, science, medicine and philosophy … "

Islam was able to preserve and eventually spread the Greco-Roman heritage by means of a chain of great libraries extending from India in the east to Spain in the west.

For example, the Cairo library under Muslim rule reportedly had 200,000 volumes and the Cordova in Moorish Spain had 400,000.

The latter and other large libraries in Spain were of crucial importance because, as Europe emerged from The Dark Ages, and scholars discovered these great Spanish libraries, with their collections of Greco-Roman classical literature - literature which then "poured over the Pyrenees" into other European countries.

Mr. Conway, to support his attack on Islam, also quotes extremist Muslim leaders such as the Ayatollahs Khomeini and Sistani. However, all religions, of course, have their extremists. Christianity, after all, had its Inquisition, etc.

Thomas C. McClintock

Corvallis

Comparing war tactics, and new

In "Churchill's History of the English-Speaking Peoples," Winston Churchill noted "More is expected of the high command than determination in thrusting man to their doom."

Churchill's condemnation of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's intransigence in pressing the siege at Cold Harbor in 1864 seems appropriately applied to George Bush's Iraq strategy today (June 21), when the news tells of another 12 Americans dead - adding to the toll of more than 3,500 killed - with no end in sight.

Thomas J. Owens

Corvallis