Read an Excerpt
The Raid at Lake Minnewaska
Book I: A Minnesota Lake Series Novel
By J. L. Larson
iUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2012 J. L. Larson
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-9844-5
Chapter One
The British-made engine purred as the old air machine doggedly continued its flight in the uneasy skies of central Minnesota on that Friday, June 5th, 1931. It was almost fourteen years since that biplane had made its last reconnaissance flight over the English Channel. Since then, after a small respite, it had surprisingly continued on to be quite airworthy and active. This model known as the Sopwith Camel had risen from post-war salvage to become a privately-owned craft. Some said this re-conditioned biplane never looked better; others said before its initial flight it didn't look that dependable.
It was late that afternoon that the owner of the aged biplane, James Lawton, was heading towards Lake Ida near Alexandria, Minnesota from the Twin Cities. It was to be a weekend spent with some college and business friends playing some golf and mostly having two days of good times. Flying over Kimball, Minnesota and heading on towards Paynesville, Lawton never got over the shear beauty of the peaceful countryside. It was like a painting with the spread of lakes and marshes as far as the eye could see. Glancing at his watch, he was satisfied with his progress despite a growing head wind. Unfortunately, there was a problem developing ahead he would not be able to ignore. He'd been hoping to beat a distant broad cloud cover to his destination, but it was becoming evident he wasn't going to win. The shear size of the darkening hue had dulled his awareness of the growing cloud system, but now had become more defined with each passing mile.
It was quite apparent this weather mass was not a minor rain shower. The system created a blackening tinge from the Willmar area on his left to as far as the eye could see to the north on his right. He saw no lightning in the immediate distance, but there was no denying the huge low-pressure weather formation was obviously packed with some punch. He swore under his breath knowing it would be hit or miss whether he could make it to Lake Ida even that night depending on the length and ferocity of the storm. One thing for certain, he'd learned not to test his courage against Mother Nature. If all hell was going to break loose, he intended to be on the ground under some shelter.
But, seeing a slight opening in the large weather system to the west, he still maintained a slight hope. As he flew past Paynesville, he re-directed his course slightly north towards Sauk Centre hoping to slip between the approaching storm cells. Within minutes, though, even that maneuver showed little chance of success. The sky to the northwest had turned darker and the headwind had become more pronounced.
Nonetheless, that small sliver of lighter sky on a more westerly course kept up his hopes. Lawton was determined. He had to give it a try. He redirected his biplane on that heading. If it worked, it would be something he could brag about to his friends ... that he snuck his air machine between the two major thunderstorms just before they joined.
Peering over the side of the fuselage, Lawton had a sense where he was. Locating State Hwy. #28 below, he knew he was on the roadway from Sauk Centre to Glenwood. With Lake Amelia near Villard straight ahead, he anticipated flying around the south edge of the lake where he could better evaluate his chances for completing his flight. The main challenge he faced was how far back to the northwest the dense cloud cover reached as well as how fast the storm to the southwest was approaching the more northern storm.
His defying the odds ended less than a minute later. It was then he saw the first flash of lightning. It was in the direction of his destination. It was no doubt pouring rain in Alexandria. Just like that, his mind closed down. No longer was he interested in being in the air. There would be no flying around or between anything. He didn't compete with lightning whether on the golf course or in the air. An open air cockpit and a thunderstorm were not a good mixture.
Then another burst appeared straight ahead much nearer than he expected. No more delays. It was time to find a reasonable landing area and get his machine safely on the ground. He felt no panic or great discomfort. This experience was not new. He'd lost count how often he'd had to land someplace quickly and wait out the storm under some kind of cover.
Descending to a more visible altitude less than a thousand feet above the ground, he examined the curving State Hwy. #28 right below him. He was aware the town of Glenwood was straight ahead, but he wasn't familiar with the location of the town's airfield. He remembered one of his flying buddies talked about the Glenwood airfield being located on the bluffs above Lake Minnewaska. This really wasn't the time to go in search of this landing strip with the conditions deteriorating by the minute.
Then a brilliant display of lightning on the north side of Lake Amelia to his right again caught him off guard. It was extremely close. The storm was moving much faster than he'd estimated. Now less than five hundred feet above the ground, his head was hanging out over the edge of the fuselage scanning the area for any dry, flat patch of ground. He swore a blue streak having put himself in this dire situation ... something he'd promised himself repeatedly in the past to never do again. Now because of his impatience in getting to Alexandria, he'd inadvertently put himself in danger beyond what he'd normally found acceptable. Moreover, his concern wasn't just about his personal well-being, but he wasn't in the mood to have to pay Sam, his mechanic, for major repairs on his old relic.
Another flash of lightning and he brought his biplane down less than two hundred feet over State Hwy. #28. The atmosphere ahead to the west had become as dark as the sky to the north. Lawton strained to see any dependable landing field. Another streak of lightning straight ahead with an accompanying clamorous echo of thunder made that search no longer a consideration. The storm was coming at him just too aggressively. The wind had increased and his flight had become choppy. He'd definitely misinterpreted this entire weather system. It was time to set the biplane on the ground even if he had to land on State Hwy. #28.
Descending to less than forty feet above the roadway, some droplets of rain began pelting his face and small windshield. Countless times in his flying career, he had chosen caution over valor when bad weather was in front of him. His mind clicked back to the times he'd landed on anything that resembled an airstrip. If no flat land then roadways were preferred for emergency landings ... especially in the marshy terrain of rural Minnesota. The concern pilots always had to face was whether the unfamiliar ground was actually firm. Land appearing clear could be so deceptive. The soft and muddy terrain in central Minnesota was not like landing in southern Minnesota, Iowa and South Dakota where the earth tended to be more consistently firm.
State Hwy. #28 had become his only alternative. With a roadway landing his eyes scanned nervously for some kind of cover once on the ground, even if it was just a grove of trees. That initiated another flash, but this one was in his mind. It caused more of an unease ... as in the reality that cars tended to have the priority over airplanes on the highways. By far he'd had more close calls with automobiles or horse-drawn wagons when making emergency landings on roads than difficulties with his biplane while in the air. He'd often contemplated if his air machine landed on a lonely country road and slammed into a car at an intersection, would the accident and his ensuing death be classified as just another traffic fatality?
Approaching Glenwood, he made a quick glance backward toward beautiful, spring fed Lake Amelia. The sky was so black he couldn't even make out that lake's nearest shoreline. He was officially in the middle of a major storm center, and he was not yet on the ground. The hilly, curving road made it difficult to put down. Ahead he was aware of the massive Lake Minnewaska. He'd seen it in the distance in previous trips to Alexandria. Now he was just a few short miles from the lake, yet it remained unseen. That brought on another concern. There were bluffs above the lake. If he suddenly reached those bluffs, there would be no more flat terrain for him to land. There would only be a steep descent into the community. Landing downhill onto a tree-lined street entering Glenwood would be a ticket to disaster. He didn't like his chances of his plane or himself surviving that type of emergency landing. For the first time he accepted his hazardous situation had transformed into a deathly one as well. He had to land immediately on the road above the bluffs whether the roadway was straight or not.
He readied his biplane and himself for a gusty ... and gutsy ... landing on the state highway now literally right below his wheels. He strained to look ahead praying there was no on-coming traffic. He again felt extreme anger having put himself into a baleful situation despite self promises never to do so again.
A bolt of lightning hit the ground dead ahead momentarily giving him the picture of how close he was to the very crest of the hill overlooking Lake Minnewaska and the town. He lowered his biplane one last time awaiting the feel of his wheels touching down on the cement covered highway.
Then two things happened concurrently. A gust of wind and heavy rain hit Lawton's air machine head on causing his plane to lurch upward ... and simultaneously a vehicle appeared out of nowhere coming right at him. There would be no reason to believe the driver would ever contemplate a flying machine could be bearing down on him. It was one of those random situations pilots and a driver in a car could have no control over ... and it was about to take place in seconds.
Then, as if divinely guided, the vehicle veered into a farmyard driveway just before the biplane's wheels made contact with the highway ... as if the two of them had rehearsed that moment several previous times.
The biplane blazed by the driveway with the left wings barely missing the back of the farmer's automobile. Lawton wondered if the driver had even seen him.
Once on the pavement, his air machine slowed abruptly against the gale wind. He barely sensed the heavy rain pelting him in the face given the sweat pouring down from his brow. He let out a roar of exhilaration and relief for surviving the landing. Looking back toward the farmhouse, he watched an old Plymouth sedan gamely drive up the long, potted driveway seemingly oblivious to the potential death despising incident the car had just avoided.
Quickly Lawton gathered his wits. Another vehicle could be coming down the road with little time to stop. More worrisome, the wind threatened to tip the plane if he didn't turn it around, head back up the roadway with the wind at his back, and drive off onto that same driveway where the vehicle had turned.
The entire sky then burst forth with an electrical storm that seemingly had no boundaries. Lawton felt like a target on that open road vulnerable to the next series of lightning bolts. The biplane had to be put under some cover or he'd face losing the small craft. Revving up his engine, he hurriedly turned toward that pathway. Something or somebody on that farm would have to give him safe refuge and a windbreak for his beloved plane.
As he coaxed his biplane along the potted driveway, he doubted the family living at the farm would hear the roar of his engine through the din of the torrential wind and rain. Arriving at the farmyard, he guided his machine over toward the leeward side of the barn as if he'd done that maneuver hundreds of times before. Crawling out of the cockpit, he hastily unraveled some canvas from within the fuselage. Before he threw it over the cockpit opening, he unstrapped his saturated golf bag and clubs behind his seat and slung them over his shoulders. His suitcase remained in the biplane. Even in the worst of conditions, there were priorities.
After blocking his wheels, Lawton slogged through the wind, rain and lightning to the farmer's front door and loudly knocked. A slightly wet, but tall, slender, pleasant-looking fellow answered the door. The man had literally just run into his house from his old sedan and had obviously not been aware of any other arrival ... unique or otherwise ... to his farm. The farmer just stared in astonishment for a couple seconds at the pitiful vision in front of him.
Standing there like a drenched dog, his goggles half askew over his face, and his golf clubs slung over his shoulders, Lawton was tempted to jokingly ask the farmer where the #7 tee box was located. Seeing the surprised look on the man's face, though, Lawton decided not to waste any attempt at subtle humor.
Instead it was Lawton who was caught off guard by the farmer's first comment. "You lost," he innocently shouted above the clamor of the storm, "or are you here for the golf tournament?"
Momentarily speechless, Lawton wondered how a farmer living in the middle of nowhere outside of Glenwood, Minnesota might know or even care about golf much less a golf tournament. Certainly, at the very least, it was a very strange greeting. Without responding, Lawton barged his way through the front entry to escape the downpour.
Shouting above another burst of thunder as he put down his golf clubs in the entry way of the small home, Lawton retorted "My friend, I hope you don't mind if I leave my vehicle out by your barn?"
The farmer, a man named John Bailey, looked back outside toward his parking area and then to his barely visible barn. His squint followed by a look of utter amazement was priceless. He had expected to see an automobile. Instead Bailey saw what must have looked like something from another planet. His jaw dropped noticeably. Without blinking he looked at Lawton in his soaked flying suit and then back towards the biplane.
"I'll be damned" was all he could say as he invited the pilot into his humble but dry little farmhouse." As he closed the front door, he said it again.
* * *
Coincidences so often contribute to new paths in people's lives. It was pure happenstance when James 'Jamie' Lawton was forced to land his storm threatened biplane that Friday evening on that highway one mile east of Glenwood and then sought safety at the John Bailey farm. That landing would be the first step of a strange set of occurrences in which he ... and Bailey ... and three other individuals would come together quite by accident that upcoming weekend. Their lives would be literally uprooted and changed forever just because of that emergency landing.
What was odd from the very start was that these five individuals even came together at all. Three of them happened to be in town only temporarily ... two on a lark and one on what can be described as 'a work assignment'. The other two individuals, John Bailey and his son, Adam, were local area residents who lived on that farm on the bluffs above Glenwood overlooking the picturesque Lake Minnewaska.
The two people 'on a lark' had no intention of being anywhere near Glenwood that weekend had it not been for Lawton's desperate landing. Lawton and his friend, Charlie Davis, were attorneys by trade and close friends since their first days of law school at the University of Minnesota. Since squeaking by the state bar exam seven years before, they had maintained their friendship despite living one hundred fifty miles from each other. Lawton was a business attorney and partner in a four-man law firm in downtown Minneapolis. Davis was a sole-practitioner of law in his home town of Alexandria, Minnesota, up State Hwy. #29 thirty miles north of Glenwood.
The two locals, the father and son ... John and Adam Bailey ... had lived on that barely productive farm since the son's birth. The best thing that could be said about the decrepit Bailey property was the location of the farmhouse with that impressive view overlooking the sprawling lake. The older Bailey, a widower, was facing not only the stress of keeping his farm solvent and food on the table, he was also dealing with his own wrenching emotion regarding his son. Eighteen-year old Adam was leaving that fall for his freshman year at the University of Minnesota. The older Bailey's feelings were paradoxical. A part of him would have preferred his son remain home as was the custom of most 'eldest' sons in a farm family. But, Bailey didn't want that option to be his only son's primary choice. And, he definitely didn't want Adam to feel obligated or be saddled with the responsibility of the family farm. To Bailey, that college education would open his son's eyes to more of the world and give him some depth better to deal with the challenges for a better life in the future. If Adam never returned to the tough, thankless farm life that had possessed the Bailey heritage for three generations in the U.S ... and most assuredly many previous generations in the old country ... John Bailey sensed he would be a very contented man.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Raid at Lake Minnewaska by J. L. Larson Copyright © 2012 by J. L. Larson. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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