I think this was a very improved and unwise thing to do. Do you regard the government as the chief villain in the energy crisis? Well not really except that the government's supposed to look out for the national interest. If we're going to have an national energy policy, the government ought to make it and not the oil companies. The oil companies really have had great power. This has been the most freewheeling area of our whole economy. The oil companies clearly are the most powerful industry in the country and they really made policy and so I guess yes, the government does have a responsibility because we didn't have an national energy policy in the 60s, we don't have one now. Would you say that the politicians have failed us then? Well the energy crisis sort of boggles the minds of politicians. In this post-war period it's been the politics of more, elect me and there will be more for everybody and all the politicians play this. And suddenly to have a society of scarcity, to have to tell people less is more, this
sort of buffaloes, congressmen, senators, presidents, but I believe that nobody really thought that this could slap this country down or stop us in our tracks the way it did last winter. You'd all is right, what happened during the winter was a rude awakening for Americans long accustomed to a culture where growth has been the golden goal. So when the Arabs turned off the spicket, we weren't prepared to cope with the consequences. There was bewilderment and frustration and anger and among those on the front lines such as the truckers there was even violence and some death. A trucker's strike raised the specter of economic paralysis for much of the country and a revolt by service station operators threatened a gas blackout in some areas. But for most people the crisis meant waiting and fuming in long gas lines. In 22 states, car owners bought gas only on odd or even numbered days.
The weights were longest in February when thousands of service stations ran out of gas. And as Jim Lera reports, the crisis affected almost every facet of life in one typical town. We went to Nashua, New Hampshire because of its location and its character. This area was hit hard by oil and gas shortages because there are no refineries in that part of the country and it depends almost entirely on imported fuel. And it's colder in New Hampshire in February than in many other parts of the country adding still another crisis factor. The special nature of Nashua also interested us is the fastest growing city in the northeast, caught in a struggle between being a relatively quiet country town or a fresh air suburb of Boston 45 miles away. But Nashua still looks the way it has for almost 125 years, a picturesque New England mill town.
Yet the postcard view of the river is deceiving. Nashua's population is 67,000, a 50 percent increase in 10 years. The great textile mills of that earlier time still dominate the skyline, but instead of spindles and looms, they now house modern industries, making electronic gadgets and plastic toy lawn mowers. Nashua also kept its main street, the kind Sinclair Lewis once called the climax of American civilization, a homey busy thoroughfare of commerce and small business. The type of main street were old timers, trade busy body gossip and strong opinion, and in mid-winner on main street there was primarily one topic of conversation. But all these things and considerations, you're kind of going to work and travel a hundred miles which are kind of today and think that you're going to get all the gas, think you can because you're kind, 95 percent of people don't want to walk today, they want to ride.
Yeah. I'm old man now and there's so many cars on that all day, you've got to be, you know, I'm in. Yes, I know there is. I know there are many people who have a car, it's way cold. The older folks had seen Nashua through many crises, wartime, floods, fires, the shut down of the mills, but this was a new kind of emergency. It cracked the assumption that cheap gasoline and oil would always flow and when the oil trucks began rolling into town less often, Nashua knew the energy crisis was real. It's time for the show now, on W.S.A.M. Here is Ed Vicious now. Here we are, the evening edition of Open Line. Ready to accept your calls, and you'll lay it on the line. Today was an odd day. Today was the one for the odd fellows. Downtown, like the Mercury Open, why would you like to join us? This gas situation in Nashville is real. Believe it or not, there are 43,000 cars and trucks in the city of Nashville alone.
The 60 stations in Nashville have a total of 86,000 gallons of gas per day to sell. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that allows two gallons per day per car. If the federal government is going to allocate gasoline and they damn well about it allocated equally, and this is really what it all comes down to. When a guy comes in for gas, sell him up. He won't go into somebody else's line. He created their own line in the city by only giving them a little bit of gas. Fill him up and they won't be back. This gas thing is a ridiculous thing. And most of us, I think, believe it, and I think most of us are right. There's no such thing right now. Only trouble is, there's nobody in Washington doing any fighting for us. I agree with him. Something's rotten in Denmark. Something's been rotten in Denmark for a long time. Hello? Hello, Ed. Yes. We're here from Congressmen. They're talking about gas, right? I still think the free end price system would work if the government would get out of it. Well, we'll continue in just a moment.
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