I am a woman who has lost something of great value to me, and I am imploring you, the reader, to help me. Friday, the 16th, I attended the Up With People fundraising gala at the University’s Student Union Ballroom. Somehow I lost my camera — a Kodak Easy Share small red digital camera with irreplaceable pictures and video, commemorating an event and memories of my involvement with this organization.

I too was once young and full of hopes and dreams of making this world a better place. I traveled with Up With People at 21, and performed with the group all over the United States, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, and Mexico, for one year! That Friday night I reconnected with this time in my life, and the evening was one I will always remember.

Up With People originated in Tucson in 1965, and was here for 25 years, and it is the University’s library’s privilege to house all the archives of this great organization, which now finds its home in Denver.

On my camera’s new memory card were once-in-a-lifetime pictures of myself with Mr. Blanton Belk, the founder and former president of Up With People, and also miscellaneous pictures and video of the evening. I also had a picture of myself with Mr. Herb Allen, my cast music/show director. Herb taught 120 kids, from all over the world, all the songs of our two-hour show, and we learned all this music at Centennial Hall — yes, right here on the campus of the UA! Have you ever lost anything that cannot be replaced? If so, then you know how it feels — awful. Please help me find this camera.

If you are reading this article, and you picked it up that Friday night, know that I do not care about the camera — it really is the memory card with the pictures I want. You can email me linker_lindayahoo.com, and we can work something out. To the reader: Thank you for anything you can do to help me retrieve these memories.

— Linda Linker,
Tucson, Ariz.

Online Comments

In response to the March 29 column, “Underage students should get fake IDs”:

Perhaps this op-ed on fake IDs and drinking was intended as some sort of joke, but, in fact, it is not funny. Rather, it appears to officially endorse various illegal activities: fake ID, underage drinking or possession of alcohol, identity theft, even resisting arrest.

Believe it or not, merely printing this column puts the Daily Wildcat at some legal risk. Suppose someone takes this tripe to heart and successfully gets a fake ID, buys alcohol with it, and hosts a “full-blown rager,” and then someone gets seriously hurt, or worse, while being drunk as a result of all this. On top of the anguish of injury or death, it could be claimed that this column implied it was OK to break all those laws, and therefore the Wildcat could be held partially liable.

I’d guess that UA Risk Management has already been in touch, asking for, if not demanding, a retraction.

— Paul Sheppard