The sky sheriff: The pioneer spirit lives again in the Texas Airplane Patrol

The Pioneer Spirit Lives Again in the Texas Airplane Patrol
By Thomson Burtis
Illustrations by B. J. Rosenmeyer
Sure enough, there was a mounted man crossing a tiny clearing, two or three miles to the westward
The blazing sun of a Texas afternoon turned air and drab brown earth to gold. Not a breath stirred the huge white stocking that served as a wind-indicator on the airdrome of the McMullen Flight of the Air Service border patrol.
Seven men were standing in a line south of the airdrome. Six of them were tanned young chaps with the look of the open in their steady eyes with tiny sun-crinkles at the corners. The other man wore a flowing gray mustache, a sombrero that dwarfed the others’ Stetsons, and ornately embossed cowboy boots. He was known from one end of the Rio Grande to the other as Sheriff Bill Trowbridge.
A low drone came to the ears of the group, and far in the distance they glimpsed the tiny form of a ship, diving with motor on for the airdrome. Hickman looked up at the plane.
“Probably Tex MacDowell and Sleepy Spears.”
“Who’s Spears?” asked Trowbridge.
“New man from the Air Service Mechanics’ School at Donovan Field,” explained Perkins. “He’s the sleepiest-looking guy in the world. Yesterday Tex and Sleepy announced they were going to fly to Laredo, if I’d let ’em, and go over to the ‘Bee’ hangout in Nuevo Laredo, and either win a fortune or else get entirely broke.”
Captain Perkins’s face was serious.
Sheriff Trowbridge glanced at him sharply. Apparently there was somewhat of puzzlement, disapproval, in the new commanding officer’s words.