From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for Jan. 6, 1974:

The ice on Kansas University’s Potter Lake was caught in a bureaucratic tangle. The decision of the ice thickness and safety for skating had fallen through the cracks, with the end result being that no one at KU was officially responsible for deciding when the lake was frozen enough to support skaters. For many years, a maintenance worker from the Physical Education Department had tested the ice by cutting holes in it, with a 4-inch thickness being considered the minimum required for safety. The biggest problem with that system, according to physical education professor and former department chair Henry Shenk, was that springs under the lake prevented the ice from freezing to a uniform thickness. KU Executive Secretary Richard Von Ende had decided the previous fall that Security and Parking would determine ice safety, but Mike Thomas, director of that department, said his office hadn’t checked the ice yet and didn’t particularly want to — a view that current Physical Education chair Wayne Osness said he could understand. “If you say the ice is safe and someone falls through, you have a liable situation,” Osness said. “How do you say when ice is safe? I don’t want the responsibility, frankly.” Meanwhile, an unidentified skater reported that he had measured the ice today and found it to be 7 inches thick and growing. Skaters were reported to be using the lake in spite of its undetermined safety status.