Although the field supposedly was closed to all civilians, we boys in time acquired certain privileges. The guards would look the other way when we sneaked under the fence, and unless some high-up officer was around, we had the run of the place as long as we kept out of mischief.
From some favorite vantage-point we were observers of the exciting life that passed on the field. More than once we witnessed the result of a mechanical defect or a cadet’s instant of panic or bad judgment in the air. There would be a flash of hurtling wings in the sunlight; then a heap of twisted metal and splintered wood and torn cloth on the ground—and the ambulance racing out to collect its gruesome freight.
Or lying on our backs in the dusty grass, we watched the silvery specks high above us as they dipped and soared and looped, or came fluttering down in long, giddy tailspins. We knew the different makes of planes, their horsepower, their speed, their dependability. We knew the names of the instructors and cadets, and their nicknames. We knew each one’s reputation for skill and daring.
The possibility that sometime we might be taken for an air ride ourselves was a thing we often discussed. I would have given my right arm gladly for such a chance. The cadets would promise us rides easily, but when we approached anyone with real authority, we were summarily dismissed and threatened with being chased off the field.
I don’t remember how the idea of stealing a ride first came up, but it grew to be our most absorbing topic of conversation. Frank and I had hooked rides on the big army trucks that lumbered up and down the road. We had hooked rides on freight-trains down in the railroad yards. Hooking a ride on an airplane, while it was a hundred times more daring, didn’t seem utterly impossible to us.
One hot, dazzlingly bright July afternoon, Frank and I decided to visit the field. Coming around the corner of the hangars we saw there was something of special interest going on. A group of officers and cadets was gathered about a trim little monoplane standing headed out toward the field with its engine throttled down and running smoothly.
As no one stopped us, we soon brazenly pressed in closer. It was a new ship, a Vicker-Vimy pursuit plane imported from England which was about to receive a tryout. Two of the field’s best flyers were in the cockpit, coats buttoned and helmets strapped on, all ready to start.
We slipped around to the other side of the plane where nobody happened to be at that moment and crouched down under the trailing edge of the wing. The wheels and axle of the landing-gear were only a few feet away. No one was paying any attention to us.
“Now’s your chance to steal a ride,” said Frank, pointing to the axle. This was a stream-shaped wooden strut, flatly oval, about ten inches wide and six feet from wheel to wheel. There were bracing wires and struts crisscrossing above it that looked like good hand-holds.