Tansill

Frank Bowens never learned to read as a child. He was diagnosed as having a learning disability and was forced to repeat most of his grade school years.Despite his illiteracy, he rose to a white-collar job at Bethlehem Steel Corp.'s Sparrows Point plant. He had his secretary read his mail.Less than a year ago, Bowens, 57, began taking classes at the Learning Place Northwest in northwest Baltimore, where he quickly learned to read and write.The reading classes were available, he said, because of funding from the United Way of Central Maryland, which today kicked off this year's campaign with a breakfast attended by about 1,000 people at the Omni Inner Harbor Hotel.

An Anne Arundel County Circuit judge sentenced a National Institutes of Health hazardous ma- terials manager to 10 years in prison Friday for killing his wife in the couple's Annapolis home. The sentence was the maximum that Steven John Washko, 45, could receive under his plea agreement, reached in September. The sentence for the reduced charge of manslaughter in the death in January of his wife, Linda, 43, was what prosecutors and the victim's family sought. It included a recommendation for evaluation for treatment at Patuxent Institution.

The tornado that ripped through Reisterstown Thursday afternoon is expected to cost Baltimore County up to $1 million, said County Administrator Frank Robey.Mr. Robey said that overtime for police and firefighters, coupled with costs to inspect and condemn buildings, repair utilities, handle traffic and find shelter for those left homeless will likely amount to between $750,000 and $1 million.The county will continue to operate an emergency center at Franklin Middle School, 120 Main St., Reisterstown, until 6 p.m. Wednesday, Mr. Robey said.

The United Way of Central Maryland is betting that guilt will speak louder than words in this year's campaign to raise $34.8 million.The charity has moved away from its standard advertising method, which built an awareness of the United Way and its programs, and taken a more hard-hitting approach, attempting to stir emotions by featuring abused children, homeless people and the elderly in television ads that began running Aug. 27."People need to be convinced thatthere is a greater sense of urgency, especially with government funding for social services being cut back," United Way spokesman Mel Tansill said yesterday.

Catonsville-based Erickson Foundation is opening a vacation retreat in Maine that will focus on helping recent and soon-to-be retirees map out the next phase of their lives. The foundation, a nonprofit associated with the chain of retirement communities run by Erickson Retirement Communities, purchased the 380-acre Point Lookout retreat on Penobscot Bay in Northport in December and plans a grand opening in July, an Erickson spokesman said yesterday. Point Lookout was built in the 1990s as a corporate retreat and conference center for credit card company MBNA, which was acquired by Bank of America.

The state Board of Public Works yesterday approved the sale of a former 152-acre facility for the mentally retarded to a Catonsville company that plans to convert it into a $250 million retirement community.Senior Campus Living Inc.'s $9.1 million purchase of the former Great Oaks Center land, which straddles the Prince George's-Montgomery County line, is contingent upon local zoning and site plan approval.The company, developer of the Charlestown and Oak Crest Village communities in Catonsville and Parkville, respectively, plans to build up to 2,000 senior living units, a nursing home, medical center and other facilities at Great Oaks.

After a lackluster start, the United Way of Central Maryland seems to be gaining momentum in its annual fund-raising drive.Donations more than doubled in the past month, from $12.8 million to $28.3 million, a spokesman said. United Way, which started the campaign Sept. 23, has until Jan. 31 to reach its goal of $40 million."We think the message is getting out," spokesman Mel Tansill said. "Perhaps the anxiety level over the economy is finally over."United Way officials have maintained that Maryland's weak economy was their biggest concern going into the 1992 campaign.

The husband of a woman found beaten to death Tuesday in her home near Annapolis has been charged in a warrant with first-degree murder, but Anne Arundel County police said Friday that he will not be arrested until his release from a hospital after an apparent suicide attempt. The body of Linda Tansill Washko, 43, was found by relatives in the foyer of the couple's home on Sonne Drive in the Bon Haven neighborhood west of Annapolis after they were unable to reach her by telephone, police said.

Al Blackburn didn't have an Orioles jersey. In fact, unlike most of the contestants, he didn't wear anything in the O's trademark orange hue. However, he did bring his baseball glove. He has fielded a ball or two at shortstop. And he does have twinkling baby-blue eyes. Oh, and one more thing. "I think I have the Cal Ripken hairdo under control," the 81-year-old joked of his barely-there hairline. "I owe it all to my hairdresser." Blackburn's physical attributes -- and his "spirit," as the judges pointed out -- won him top honors in yesterday's Cal Ripken Jr. Look-Alike Contest at the Charlestown retirement community in Catonsville.