The story of how he obtained this bear cub is at once humorous and frightening. One afternoon in the summer of 1947, when I was 5 years old, he had gone hunting, flying the Cub alone onto one of the many meadows in the local mountains. He had circled the area to make sure there were no unseen boulders that would break off the landing gear or break the wooden propeller, and that there were no bear or moose lying in the meadow grass. He even buzzed the scrub alder trees at the edge of the clearing to scare away any critters that might want to investigate him and his conveyance before he was ready for them. Remember, getting out of a Cub was no small task for even a regular sized person; for a large man such as Moose, it was time consuming labor.
Then he landed, took his 30.06 rifle and binoculars, and set out to bag a moose or bear. In those days it was not unusual for a pilot to kill wild game, field strip and butcher it, wrap it in burlap, tie the quarters to the wing struts and fly his bounty back home. I have seen everything from moose, bear and caribou, tied in burlap bags, to fox and wolves hanging head down, tied to a plane’s wing struts as it flew across the school to land at Merrill Field.
He found a small bear cub alone at the clearing’s edge and carried it back to the waiting plane. Tying it in a large burlap bag, he placed in on the front seat and prepared to climb in the rear pilot’s seat when he heard the roar of the angry mother bear as it thrashed its way through the alder brush towards him. Having not seen the mother before, and knowing well of its very protective nature towards her young, he was now caught off guard by her sudden appearance. He closed the door on that side of the plane, ran around to the other side, opened the door and grabbed his rifle. No sooner did he have it in hand than she was nearly upon him, her sharp teeth ready to tear into his flesh and her razor sharp claws equally up to the task of shredding him.
“I didn’t want to shoot her,” he said, “as I was certain she had another cub to care for. But I didn’t have time to prime the engine and take off before she could damage the plane’s fabric.” Now, priming was necessary to the starting of these little planes, as they did not have electric starters. To facilitate a lone pilot taking off by himself, the plane was designed for one person operation. First, the pilot locked open the door, reached in and pulled out the choke and set the throttle forward a little bit. Then, he went to the front of the plane and turned the propeller several revolutions, pulling down on the upper shaft so it spun halfway around with a loud “thuppppt - thuppppt - thuppppt”, priming the engine. After the carburetor had filled sufficiently, he went back to the cockpit and turned the power on - “switch on” in pilot parlance - before going back to the propeller and giving it one or two last turns. This was the tricky part: The planes had no parking brakes and once the engine “caught” the plane started to taxi without the pilot in it. So, he had to run under the wing, around the side of the plane, being careful to avoid the spinning propeller and the low hanging wing struts, climb into the back seat through this little opening, then apply the brakes, adjust the choke and throttle and set the tabs before starting his takeoff roll.
Flying in the late 1940s was not for the faint of heart!
With little time to react, Moose shot the female bear as it came upon him. Tying his burlap bags around it, but not cutting it up, he started his plane and flew the cub back to the field and to the care of my parents. However, he didn’t tell anyone about the incident with the mother bear, but quickly left again to “find the cub’s mother.”
Several hours later Moose’s plane we seen flying erratically towards the airport, zigging and zagging, climbing and diving, rocking left and right, as though a drunk were at the controls. It passed in front of the tower several times so the air traffic controllers, themselves veterans of the military as was Moose, could look directly into the plane’s cockpit. And look they did, with binoculars to their eyes and disbelief on their faces. For Moose was nowhere in sight and sitting in the front seat of his plane was a black bear!
Once, twice, three times the plane careered towards the tower, each time coming so close the men in it dove for cover. Then, it banked sharply, flew erratically to the far end of the north/south runway and dropped to the gravel below, its engine alternately roaring and whispering as the plane and its astonishing pilot bounced along the gravel towards Fifth Avenue. Workers poured from the tower, the many hangers that bordered the street, from the flying school and even from cars that had stopped dead in the middle of Fifth Avenue - all running down the rocky runway to see what evil had befallen their friend.
Part way up the runway the plane’s engine quit and the yellow Cub rolled silently to a stop. The door did not open. There was no movement discernible inside. The men ran up to its doors and peered inside. They saw only the bear sitting upright in the seat, its huge paws tied to the front stick. A heap of bloody burlap was on the rear seat. Fearing the worst, and afraid to open the doors until they had armed themselves, they pushed the plane the rest of the way up the runway to the tower area. After one of them retrieved a handgun from his car, they cautiously opened one door. Suddenly the burlap shot up and a loud roar filled the plane. They fell back in fear and surprise, stumbling over each other in their panic. Then the panic turned to broad grins of relief: Moose sat up in the back seat, laughing heartily at the spectacle he had created.
As he told them all later, he had gone back to that meadow, loaded the bear in the plane, tying it in place, then flown back to town. As he approached the airfield he had scrunched down in the back seat - where he had put his long legs no one could figure out - and covered himself with the burlap sacks he had tied around the dead bear. He had been laughing till his stomach ached as he buzzed the tower and decided to land only after he became fearful they would try to shoot the bear while he was still in the air.
And while the grown men must have wondered how he squeezed his huge frame into the back seat, I was wondering how anybody could pick up a black bear by himself.
- - - - - - - - - -
Here I am with the Black Bear
cub, at about age 5.
Now, isn't that just the
cutest thing you've
ever seen???
No comments:
Post a Comment