It turned out to be more work than I had imagined, but I had done it. Day 1, KSAC to KMSP, Sacramento to Minneapolis. During the time I had the plane and all systems checked and updated. My baby was ready and so was I. I input the flight info into the computer and it came up 1,316 miles and five hours forty-seven minutes flying time. The computer automatically checked the weather from satellites. All clear along the flight path and tail winds most of the way. One reason I was flying west to east was the prevailing winds blow that direction. I’d fly higher on this leg to catch the tail winds, reported at 50 knots, and to get over the Sierra and the Rockies, so I’d be on oxygen the whole time.
I taxied to the end of the runway. I set the rudder tab to 6 degrees right, ailerons to 6 degrees right wing down, and elevators to 1 degree nose up. The right tab was to compensate on take off for the torque of the powerful engine and the elevator setting was to help keep the tail down when the prop revved up. That big prop would push so much air that the tail wanted to lift up and drive the nose into the runway, not real good for the propeller. Since I was on a hard runway, I didn’t need flaps. The Corsair only needed the extra lift to get off the short deck of a carrier. The takeoff run was only 900 feet off a hard runway with this load. The tower cleared me to take off, I ran the engine up to military power, and watched as the airspeed climbed. The plane flew itself off the runway and I turned northeast and headed for a trip around the world. I felt giddy with the idea. I was going to fly around the world, or at least, I was going to try. Or die trying. The old bromide flitted through my head, I hoped not as an omen. I shook it off and smiled at the beginning of a quest.
In a few hours I would be in Minnesota, 1,316 air miles from where I started. As I sped east, I thought about the people who had settled these lands. First, a group from Europe, the Clovis people related to the Solutreans of France, came over by sailing and found a virgin continent teeming with game and predators. The abundance of game made up for the predators and in a thousand years these initial occupants had moved from the East coast across the continent. A few thousand years later a climate change encouraged a second wave of immigrants from Siberia across a land bridge. These people conquered the first inhabitants and became the folks we call Native Americans. They were the next to last conquerors. Then another group of light skinned barbarians, my ancestors, fled Europe and its despots, to found a religious Eden, at least, that’s what they intended. They took a few hundred years to conquer the conquerors, getting even for killing off the Clovis people, and created the United States. What goes around comes around. They traveled across the continent that sped below me in wagons, taking six months to travel the same distance I would travel in less than six hours. A thousand years had become six hours; we call it progress.
First, I traveled over the barren stretches of Nevada and Utah, clipping the northern end of the Great Salt Lake. Next up was Wyoming. I saw Cheyenne on the map and thought of the Cheyenne. I could only picture them as Thomas Berger painted them in Little Big Man. I looked down at the rolling plain and saw Old Lodge Skins sitting in his tepee, smoking his pipe, and pondering the fate of the white boy sitting across from him. What if I had been that scared white boy? Could I have lived among the Cheyenne where death and life were inextricably entwined? Could I look across the plains and see a Pawnee band and say, “Today is a good day to die,” and ride off screaming my war chant? By the way, if you have ever seen the movie and think you know the story, forget it! Hollywood, as usual with any good book, fucked it up. Read the book.
The Great Plains rolled by under my wings. As far as the eye could see, and at altitude that is a long way, I could make out the regular shapes of farmed fields: rectangles, squares, and circles depending on the water available. The imprint of man had reshaped the very land itself. A few hundred years ago these plains teemed with buffalo and antelope. They fed a few thousand humans. Now, they had been domesticated, watered, and fertilized and they fed three hundred million people. We call it progress.
I thought about the modern Luddites who wanted to scrap what we call civilization and return to the old days. We could, if we were willing to watch 299 million people starve, since the old way would only support those few. That is the flaw in the argument to 'Return to nature;' only one in a hundred thousand could live the old ways. These modern eco-terrorists, like Earth Now, say they are lovers of nature, painting their struggle as a fight for Nature, with a capital N. But they aren’t really lovers. Anyone who could seriously support the idea that the starving death of 299 million people is a good idea has to be a hater; a hater of Mankind, not a lover of Nature. Groups like Earth First and PETA put Joseph Stalin, Adolph Hitler, and Pol Pot all to shame as haters of man.
As I flew northeast, the land gradually changed from brown to green, the plains changed to forest and I entered the land of 10,000 lakes. I began a gradual descent as I approached the Twin Cities. The wing tanks were empty long ago and the main tank was below one quarter full. If I was in a car I would have long before pulled over to fill up. But there are no gas stations along air routes. The computer said I was fine. On the descent, I throttled back and let the stick keep up the airspeed.
I called in to Approach and was put in line for landing. The tower operator asked three times when I said the type of plane I was flying. Then the supervisor came on. I confirmed the type, F4U-4. Finally, another voice came on from a commercial jet, “It’s a World War II fighter. Give him plenty of room because the thing lands like a pig.” I laughed because he was right.
I was on the ground fifteen minutes later. I parked in the General Aviation section, an area for small planes to keep them out of the way of the jets, and arranged for refueling. I carried my gear through the building and jumped into a taxi.
I had intended to prowl the city and see if it was true about these Midwestern farm girls, but I found myself dead tired. When I hit my hotel room, I fell on the bed and couldn’t get up. I turned on the TV and ordered room service. I was asleep before I knew it. I had no idea of the physical drain of flying the Corsair for almost six hours. I tried to imagine doing it day after day in combat and couldn’t. It felt like I had run a marathon.
This turned out to be a blessing, but that’s getting ahead of the story.
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