Thunderbolt!

IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL sunny day. No time to pay strict attention to English lessons. Besides, I was daydreaming about airplanes, a disease to which I had recently succumbed. I found far more interest in the sight of two Army blimps floating lazily over Fort Sill than I did in the technicalities of splitting infinitives. The two blimps swung gently in the breeze at five hundred feet, held captive by their cables anchored close together near the balloon hangar on the Fort.

A vivid streak of flame burst suddenly into existence. Not a sound reached me, just that startling, silent flash of fire, then deep red flame mushrooming into the sky.

I stared, unbelieving. Several tiny figures tumbled through the air, twitching and jerking, as if in a frenzy. The flames engulfed both the blimps, the cables sagged, and in moments only a pall of dirty black smoke was left, drifting idly out of sight.

The next day the reality of what I had seen struck home. The hydrogen gas within one of the observation blimps had, without warning, exploded. Searing flame burst into the sky above, curled downward, licked into the personnel basket. Three men at least, perhaps four, caressed by that terrible flick of fire, had leaped in agony into space, and died.

Fort Sill was a Field Artillery School, one of the largest in the country. Often hundreds of troops would be out on the firing range, blasting with their artillery, over which hovered the big observation balloons and the blimps from which observers directed fire. At Post Field-the object of my attention since the unexpected appearance of the Three Musketeers-were based the observation planes and the pursuits which worked as advance units for the artillery.

Fort Sill lies in a valley, bordered by the foothills of the Wichita Mountains, which rise to the northwest. To the east stretch the seemingly endless rolling and flat plains, balanced by granite mountains jutting into the sky.

One of these peaks, Signal Mountain, rose to its full height within the Army's artillery range. From Signal Mountain we enjoyed a marvelous view of Fort Sill and the country where I was spending, I would come to realize, perhaps the finest years of my life. Far below us Fort Sill lay sprawled in the valley, sprinkled heavily with trees. At the right time of day the sun transformed Medicine Creek into flashing reflections, where the stream wound its way through the fort.

We could see the old Indian stockade, and the rock jail nearby. The earth and air all about me were rich in history. The basement of that very same jail had once held prisoner no less fearsome a figure than the Apache warrior, Geronimo, and it was within those walls that he had finally perished. Often, I visited this last encampment of the Indian, and wondered about his time.

The valley was abundant with oaks, maples, cottonwoods. At the eastern end of Fort Sill squatted the stockade, a massive and unlovely structure with walls of white rock, three feet thick. Here, being weathered slowly by the years, were the plaques on which I could read of Lieutenants Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, William T. Sherman ... commemorating the days when they had passed through in the mid-1840's, in the midst of the Indian Wars.

With several friends I would climb Signal Mountain, or imitate a mountain goat in scaling the steep bluffs which lay between the Signal Mountain peak and the fort where troops fired blazing shells from their big guns. Most of the time the artillery fired the big guns at night, and sometimes they used tracers. Even when they didn't, the shells were so hot we could see the incandescent steel arcing its path through the air.

Each exploding shell was another brilliant white flash. A soundless detonation in the dark. Sometimes a battery of guns would fire, the red phantoms would streak in a jumbled group up and over and down, and then the sound, ragged blasts and crumps, would reach us. More silent releases of light, and again a mass of exploding sound snatching at our ears as we watched from the bluffs.

If we looked upward with care, and concentrated, we could see the ragged blue exhausts of the observation planes, circling like droning ghosts in the night sky. This was the best part of the night firings. The Oklahoma night under a full moon was a landscape painted in faint blue and unearthly light. If there were high clouds, then the valley and the mountains beyond would become shrouded in blackness. Nothing was so startling during these times as an observation plane grumbling its way overhead, and then exploding the darkness with a release of flares.

Ever since watching the Three Musketeers perform in the aerial display by the Army's Air Service, I had special reason for visiting the Rogers Dairy or Fort Sill so that I might watch the planes at Post Field. Before long I came to know by heart the details of every one of the different types of planes at the field.

I identified each of the observation planes and the bombers, and came to recognize the various trainers which visited the grass field. My favorites were still the fighters, especially the wicked-looking little Boeing P-12 biplanes and the sleek, low-wing Boeing P-26, which, we were told, was the deadliest thing in the air. Whenever one of these airplanes passed overhead, I would look up and, at a single glance, identify the type as it sped by.

There were, however, many other things in life besides watching blazing artillery at night or airplanes at Post Field! Between Fort Sill and the mountain stretched a vast reservation where the U.S. Army let their many horses run free, animals from the cavalry and artillery, as well as beautiful polo ponies. The field was about six miles from the Johnson home, in the residential section of Lawton. My friends and I would go in a group to the field; by stretching our legs and trotting we could make it in just over an hour. Before us on the vast plain roamed several hundred horses.

We wanted to ride. At first the animals didn't share our enthusiasm, and shied from us. This meant we had to catch them, which was easier said than done. We tried everything, including the foolish attempt to catch the horses by running after them. Exhaustion soon proved the futility of this venture.

Experience taught us never to alarm the horses, but to move in quietly and slowly while they surveyed our approach. In time we developed a sure touch. We'd pat an animal gently on his neck and talk soothingly. Then one of us held the horse by his head while another fellow climbed onto his back. When alone, I'd put an arm over the horse's neck and swing up.

And then-bareback-away we went! We rode Indian style, no ropes, no saddles, just the horse and a boy on top. We would race for miles down the vast pasture land, each of us exhorting his own animal to out-speed the other mounts. We'd ride the horses just as swiftly as they could run, shouting and crying out joyously, racing like the wind, all for the sheer joy of riding.

We each had our favorite mounts, but then the urge to try something new would lead us to other animals. I became good friends with a hitch horse named Baldy, a sorrel with an all-white blaze face. Our mutual good will lasted only so long as I stayed off Baldy's back. He objected strenuously to being ridden, and when I tried, his friendliness disappeared like a shot out of a gun.

Baldy went wild. He pitched, bucked, reared, and flung himself about in wild gyrations. He did everything that a horse can possibly do to throw me off. Baldy and I had some fine rides together, for every time that I swung onto his back he seemed to go crazy. Finally, when he discovered that he couldn't get me off, he simply ignored me. I was no more to him than a big, annoying fly he couldn't shake. He'd calm down and trot off wherever he wanted to go, wholly ignoring Bobby Johnson on his back.

That is, until I dug my heels into his flank. That was it! Baldy went wild again, working frantically and desperately to shake me. Away we'd go, pitching and bucking our way across the fields. I'd shout at the horse, and Baldy would only renew his frenzied efforts to rid himself of me. He never did throw me, and I think that creature finally resigned himself to his fate. He seemed to give up, and I was able to ride him whenever I wanted.

When our day's racing was over, I'd ride my horse back to the edge of the reservation and slide off slowly. Now it was time to rub or to give him a gentle pat on his neck, to thank him for the day's fun. Each time I finished riding I was all sweated up from the horse, and my body smell wasn't one iota different from that of the animal-as Mom and my sisters often told me.

At the fence I'd leave my friends and strike out for home. A good mile and a half lay between the Army reservation and the highway. After a while I think I came to know every prairie-dog hole and every rattler in the fields.

From the highway a side road stretched another four or five miles. I could have walked this way, I suppose, but to make the trip shorter I'd cut across fields, through backyards and over fences. After one of those days of riding, I just never had any trouble falling asleep. Dad said that no sooner did my head hit the pillow than I was a goner.

Two miles west of our house was a little stream, shallow, rock-filled and muddy. It wasn't anything to look at or to get excited about, but it was a favorite meeting place where I'd get together with my friends.

The lure of the stream was the crayfish, more commonly...