DAILY NZ P A G E 1A C O L O R CMYK P U B D A T E 07-14-02 O P E R A T O R CCI  D A T E 07/14/02 T I M E 00:11

BY DANE SCHILLER 

EXPRESS-NEWS STAFF WRITER

MEXICO CITY — What taxidrivers, grandmothers and evenpriests will tell you about JuanDiego Cuauhtlatoatzín is thathe was a humble Indian whosaw an image of the VirginMary about 470 years ago.

They even can point to thespot, a hill in the north of town, about five blocks from asubway stop.

But that’s about all that mostpeople know about Juan Diego,as he’s commonly known, eventhough he is to be canonized asthe first Indian saint at the endof the month by Pope JohnPaul II.

“He was married?” a puzzledRosario Guitars Monares, 36,asked after she inspected herraw knees, bloodied from walk-ing on them for the final leg of a pilgrimage to a church nearthe holy hill known as Te-payac.

She’s not alone in her igno-rance about a man who is for-ever linked to Mexico’s queen,

 La Virgen de Guadalupe.While some historians con-

tend Diego never existed andperhaps was a ploy by thechurch to bring Indians intoCatholicism, even believers

BY W. GARDNER  SELBY

EXPRESS-NEWS AUSTIN BUREAU

MICO — Medina Dam is a gigantic concrete gir-dle designed by a visionary who later drowned off the coast of Ireland.

But last weekend, the 90-year-old structure, itslake filled to overflowing by record-setting rain-fall, seemed imperiled, leading Bexar CountyJudge Nelson Wolff to tell downriver residents toevacuate because it might fail.

For his alarm, Wolff was raspberried by local of-ficials familiar with the 164-foot-tall, 1,580-foot-longdam. They say the dam worked with its spillwayto handle the overflow just as intended when itwas built in 1912.

“We know in our hearts this is built solid,” saidGuy Cooper, a farmer on the board of the Bexar-Medina-Atascosa Water Control and ImprovementDistrict No. 1, which owns the dam west of SanAntonio.

The Texas Natural Resource Conservation Com-mission is reviewing the dam’s safety against abackdrop of conflicting inspection reports, some of which question its stability in a huge flood.

“We don’t feel like the structure is going to failimminently,” said Elston Johnson, who overseesTNRCC’s dam safety program. “We need to look atit more.”

State law requires dams and spillways to beevaluated for engineering soundness without anyset timetable. Federal recommendations urge astate inspection at least every five years.

Medina Dam’s last inspection, completed April8, questions calculations of the dam’s stability andsuggests a reduction in estimates of its “factor of safety.”

The inspection by the engineering firm URS,which was hired by the water district, found the

FLOOD OF 2002: MEDINA DAM UNDER MICROSCOPE

It’s safe, but how sound?

Water continues to flow over the spillway of Me-dina Dam, though with a measurable reduction involume.

Experts analyze the 90-year-old

structure’s integrity

with another flood in mind.

D

 

S E R V I N G S O U T H T E X A S S I N C E 1 8 6 5

Digital studioS.A.-based NewTek changingthe way movies are madeBusiness/1K

Taking offReserve pilots workhard for their wingsS.A. Life/1J

Jones says Cowboys might train at Fiesta Texas next year / 1C

$1.50

SUNDAYJULY 14, 2002 • METRO EDITION

COMING MONDAY

A 24-page section recaps the

drought-busting rains of early 

July, which forced lakes

to overflow and chased

thousands from their homes.

Saint who?Even with canonization

looming, little is known

about Mexico’s

Juan Diego.

D

Juan Diego is depicted manyways in art.

BY STEPHEN SMITH

BOSTON GLOBE

When researchers last week droppedbombshells debunking long-held beliefsabout hormones and knee surgery, itwas stunning — but hardly surprising.

The history of medicine is pocked

with reversals, yesterday’s panaceabranded as today’s poison.

Witness this swatch of advice, re-sounding with the august authority thatAmericans had come to expect from thewhite-jacketed high priests of medicine.

“The notion that a baby should nothave direct sunlight is a major mis-take,” Dr. Herman Bundesen, presidentof the Chicago Board of Health, wrote in1938 on the pages of the Ladies’ HomeJournal. “When the baby is a monthold, put him directly in the sunlight.The best time of the day is between 10and 2 o’clock.”

Doctors changed their minds aboutthat — just as they did last week whentwo medical studies challenged thevalue of hormone replacement therapyfor women and knee surgery for arthri-tis-hobbled patients.

Hormones, researchers found, ac-tually increase a woman’s risk of someof the very ills they were intended toconquer, including heart disease.

And, scientists reported, patients whounderwent arthroscopic knee oper-ations fared no better than those whogot a sham procedure.

Patients who had undergone these

treatments and critics of big medicineexpressed annoyance and outrage.

Yet medical historians and leadingphysicians view the twin reversals notas troubling setbacks for Americanmedicine but as proof that the system isdoing its job.

Science constantly is reaching newconclusions about once-widely acceptedtreatments, a tradition that validatesthe need for rigorous research and thewillingness to abandon medical ortho-doxy.

Advice can become bad medicine

See BIG/15A

Reversal of medical practices

long has been the

profession’s bitter pill.

D

DAILY NZ P A G E 1A C O L O R CMYK P U B D A T E 07-14-02 O P E R A T O R CCI  D A T E 07/14/02 T I M E 00:11

Catholicism, even believerscan’t agree on the facts of hislife, including his age, appear-ance, and what he did for a liv-ing.

“His uncle was more reli-gious than anyone in the fam-ily,” said a priest leading anoth-er pilgrimage up the hill.

“I thought (Juan Diego) wasa monk,” chimed in anotherman who overhead the priest.

Shopkeepers and street ven-dors sell T-shirts, candles andpendants depicting Juan Die-go’s encounter on a hilltop dur-ing a walk in 1531, but the im-age varies.

Some present him with the

See LIFE/12A

Medina Dam personnel survey the 90-year-old structure. Engineers are debating its durability.

PHOTOS BY KIN MAN HUI/STAFF

which was hired by the water district, found the

See EXPERTS/11A

■ Leaders wantentity tooversee floodcontrol/10A

■New Braun-fels considersbuyouts asFEMA handsout aid/10A

■ RobertRivard: Somequestions stillneed to be an-swered aboutflooding/3B

Inside

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S

BY ELAINE ARADILLAS

EXPRESS-NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thunderstorms and isolated showers dumpedup to 8 inches of rain Saturday in parts of theHill Country, causing anxious residents towince at the possibilities of more flooding.

In San Antonio, the Northwest Side receivedless than an inch of rain from the storm, whichhovered north and west of the city much of theday.

The National Weather Service forecast a 50percent chance of thundershowers for Bexar

“Another disturbance could be moving in,”said Ken Widelski, meteorologist for the Na-tional Weather Service in New Braunfels.“That’s going to be the case for the next coupleof days.”

Bandera, Kerr and Real counties received themost rainfall Saturday, with 2 to 4 inches fallingalong the Frio River, the weather service said.

Campers in the area were contacted by theFrio County Sheriff’s Department to seekhigher ground away from creeks and rivers.

County today followed by a 60 percent chanceMonday.

“The ground is so saturated around here, thesmallest amount of rain causes our creeks torise up,” said Helotes Volunteer Fire Depart-ment Chief Jack Quipp, who dispatched crewsSaturday to monitor water crossings. “I hope itquits raining altogether right now until theground dries up.”

Almost two weeks after torrential rainfallflooded areas of Central and South Texas,weather experts are predicting more rainthrough the beginning of the week.

Hill Country gets socked again by thunderstorms

See BANDERA/11A