The next morning Ed had woke me up before six.  He was sitting at the table drinking coffee as I had gotten up.
     Gathering my clothes together, I had started towards the bathroom with only my briefs on and without the blanket wrapped around me.  As I had passed him he had made a crack about my "sexy legs" and "butt" and how the boys in the training school must have been pretty unhappy when I had left.  A type of crack I was very sensitive about.
    On the way to work we had stopped at a restaurant for breakfast.  After breakfast we had proceeded onto the shop.
     We had gone up to Howard's apartment.  Howard, Bob and some other man who worked for my uncle were sitting around the kitchen table drinking coffee.  Ed had gotten himself a cup and poured himself a cup of coffee then sat down with the men.  I wanted to join the group but there were only four chairs so I had to stand by the table.
     They were sitting there discussing the job they were all going out on that day.  I had tried to follow all of what they were saying but I didn't know anything about leaded joints, elbows, nipples and all of those things.  I knew what a pipe was, I had seen a lot of those.
     I wanted to be like all of the other men who worked for my uncle and do the things they did.  But it seemed my uncle had other ideas.  I was to dig ditches, push a wheelbarrow when they needed me to, run after the men doing whatever they wanted me to do, scoop sand into my uncle's pickup truck whenever he needed it.
     Well I guess I only loaded my uncle's truck once with sand.  Because the first time I did it I flattened both of his back tires.  I thought when he said "Load it" he meant for me to fill it up, which I did, right over the sides.
     I hadn't noticed the tires being flat until he had come back and seen them.  He wasn't very happy when he had pointed them out to me, saying something about how long it was going to take me to pay for them.  It had made me feel pretty stupid, doing such a dumb thing.
     I was just a helper for all of the men.  Whenever they wanted a tool or something they would send me after it.  Everything they wanted was on the job sight, either in the storage area or the truck.
     Oh yes, they would send me after left-handed pipe wrenches, skyscrapers to scrape the ceiling with, pipe stretchers to make short pipes longer and I don't know what else.
     I would go look for all of those things, not finding what I thought they wanted, I would go back and tell them I couldn't find it or maybe we had forgot to bring it from the shop.  They would act as though they were mad at me and say I didn't know my "ass-hole from a hole in the ground.”  Then they would send me back again looking for it.  I would hear them laughing as I went back to look again.
     Of course, being a kid I was the brunt of all of their jokes and teasing.  I wanted to be accepted and be one of them in the worst way.  I didn't want them to treat me the way they were.
     When three of them, my stepfather, my cousin and the guy who worked with them got together one day and told me they were going to take my pants off and grease me, I got scared not knowing it was a big joke with them.
     It had happened at the motel that was being built on the west side of Nevãda.  The motel was being built in a "U" shape.  The floor in the west leg hadn't been laid yet, only the floor joists which ran from one side to other side had been laid in place.  The men were standing on some finished floor towards the base of the "U" and I was standing between them and the unfinished, open floor.  I had turned and ran when I seen them coming after me with the can of grease.  I jumped from joist to joist, if I had missed one joist I would have fallen between them and would have been seriously hurt.
     Looking back, I think they were cruel in the way they had treated me.  Especially my stepfather who I wanted to be accepted by more than any of the others.
     Ed seemed to lead all of the others, like it was great fun.  He would make dirty cracks at me, like, "I'll bet you were a sweet-boy at the reform school."  "How many times did you get laid by the boys?"  "Did you learn how to give good blow jobs?"
     I knew what he was talking about for I had heard all of that kind of stuff at the training school.  But I had never been involved in it.  At least not at the training school.
     One time when we had been alone on the job he told me how someday when he found me home alone, without my mother being there, he was going to take me into the bedroom and see if I was any better than a girl.
     Then I didn't know if he knew of any of the things that had happened to me at the orphanage and the juvenile home but it was all still very fresh in my mind.  I knew men did those things to boys.  So when he told me what he was going to do to me in the bedroom if he caught me alone at home, I believed that was what he was going to do to me.  It may have been a joke with him but to me he was dead serious.
     At times I liked to work with the men but when they started in on me I would have soon gone home.  But I couldn't let them know how I felt for fear they would never accept me.
     This wanting to be accepted was constantly driving me.  I would at every opportunity do or say something trying to impress them.
     One time while we had been working at the motel, while we were walking to a nearby cafe, we had walked behind a car.  I didn't know the difference in the makes of cars but I wanted to make them think I did.  So as we walked behind this car I notice on the trunk of the car, "Buick Eight."  I said, as though the car was a rarity, "Hey look!  There's a Buck Eight!"  I guess I had sounded sort of stupid.  They made fun of me the rest of the day.
     Ed had married my mother while I was still in the juvenile home, not expecting me to ever come home.  I guess neither of them ever expected me to come home.  That was why they had such a small apartment.  It had been less than a week before I had come home, they even knew I would be coming home.
     It they didn't want me, they could have sent me back any time they wanted to, all it would have taken was one call to the sheriff.  No reason, other than they didn't want to take care of me.  There were times I had wished they had for there I would have been with Mr. Parker and Laddie.
     Two weeks after my fifteenth birthday, (which went un-celebrated) on May 27, about three weeks after I had come home from the training school, my grandparents, mother, stepfather and I had gone to Mitchellville, Iowa.  To the Iowa Training School for Girls to see my sister Juanita who was four years older than I was.

Larry Eugene with sister Juanita Barbara (Dixie Lee) at the Iowa Training School For Girls at Mitchellville, Iowa May 27th, two weeks after Larry Eugene's 15th birthday

     Unknown to me at the time, Juanita had been in the training school since she was fourteen, after having been sent there by my grandmother who had custody of her at the time.
     It had been nine long years since the last time I had last seen my sister.  But I had remembered her through all of the years, from before the time I had been taken from my mother.  She was pictured in my mind as though she was a Goddess and I wasn't disappointed.
     It was Juanita's high school graduation day.  To me she was very beautiful.  The dress she was wearing she had made herself and she was very proud of it.  In contrast, the clothes I was wearing were my state issued clothes.  The white shirt, the ill fitting gray wool pants and shoes, everything but my tie clasp and tie, which Ed had loaned me, were state issued.  They had been my Sunday clothes at the Training School for Boys and I hated them.
     Wherever we went, whatever we did, we held each other's hand or had our arm about each other's waist.  This was my sister and I loved her more than anything on earth.  I felt she was proud of me as she introduced me to her friends and staff members there at the training school.  As we walked alone about the girls' school there were several girls about the campus.  I could see they were eyeing me, my sister also noticed it.  I think she enjoyed the girls looking at me for I knew she was proud and happy to be with her brother.
     She told me she would be coming home soon and how we would be together, go places and do things.  It seemed I counted the days when she would be home.
     With my first paycheck I had bought a bicycle for ten dollars.  The tires were flat, one of the peddles was broken off, the chain was missing and the seat and handle bars wouldn't stay in place.  There were no brakes, no lights or reflectors on the bike.  But to me it was like having my first brand new car.
     My mother wasn't too happy about my bike.  Seems she thought I wasn't old enough to have a bicycle.  There seems to have been a discussion between my mother, Ed and I.  I was either going to have a bicycle or I was going back to the training school.  It was the only time I had ever stood up to an adult since I had left the orphanage.  It must have worked for I kept the bike.
     My next two pay checks, to Ed's disgust, went towards fixing up my bike.  I stripped my bike down so all there was, was a frame.  Parts were laying all over the back yard, fenders here, sprocket there, wheels over against the tree.  About everywhere you looked there was a piece of my bicycle.
     With sandpaper I sanded the frame then primed it and painted it.  Installed new tires, brakes, seat, handle bars, lights and reflectors.  I could only install one new peddle, I had to have the other one welded on.  That bicycle was a Western Flier.  Wherever I went, that bicycle was sure to go, even if it was only across the street to the park.
     I had always been fascinated about airplanes, even as far back as the juvenile home.  So fascinated about them I had dreams about them when I was eleven years old.  I would read any book about airplanes I could get my hands on.  Mostly fighter planes, I had wanted to collect pictures of all of them but in institutions they wouldn't let me do those sort of things.
     So after I had fixed my bicycle up I spent most of the money I earned on airplane rides at the local airport west of town.  As soon as I got paid I would get on my bicycle and ride out to the airport.  Each time Mr. Nelson, the owner of the airport, would take me up for a half hour.  Each time he would act as though he was teaching me how to fly the plane.
     Before we took off we would walk around the plane and check it out.  Looking at the propeller for nicks, the leading edges of the wings, tail and rudder also looking there for nicks and dents.  Checking the operation of the ailerons, elevators and rudder.  He taught me how to set the trim and all of the necessary things that had to be done before we taxied out onto the runway.
     It had even got to the point where he would allow me to take off, fly the plane and land it.  He was right there if I got into trouble so that had helped me a lot.  I had most of my trouble in landing, especially if there was a slight cross wind.
     When I didn't have any money for the airplane rides, I would take my bicycle and ride the country roads north of town.
     One Saturday I had rode my bike to Ames, eight miles west of Nevada, to my paternal grandmother and stayed all night with her.  Ed hadn't been too happy about that either.  Seems I forgot to tell anyone where I was going.  If my grandmother hadn't called them they would probably never have found me.  I was happy there and I wasn't in any too big of a hurry of going back home.  But Ed and my mother had come over and haul me and my bike back to Nevada.
     It had been towards the first part of July when Juanita came home.  She slept with my mother.  Ed, to my horror, slept with me on the couch that folded down into a bed.
     I wanted to sleep in my clothes but Ed and my mother said no.  So without telling them why I wanted to sleep in my clothes I had to sleep in my T-shirt and briefs.
     As it had turned out though he hadn't fooled around with me any.  He had other things on his mind.  My sister to name all of them.  That was something I was to learn much later.
     I spent a great deal of time alone in the company of my sister, not only elsewhere about town but also at home.  She was four years and five days older than I was.  She was my sister and I was her brother but I don't think that made much difference to either of us.  We had been separated most of our lives.  She had been in the girls' training school since she was fourteen and I had spent most of my life in institutions.
     What happened to me in those first couple of weeks after my sister came home from the training school, I can't even describe to myself.  It was like I had a feeling inside of me that couldn't be satisfied.  I had to be near my sister all of the time.  I became tense and nervous when she wasn't about.  The secret we shared was so powerful.  It was a feeling like no other feeling I had ever had in my life.  I wanted to be everywhere my sister went, I didn't want to be alone without her.  I had to be with her.
     There came a day though, towards the first of August about three weeks after she had come home, we were out walking and she had told me to go home.  I had told her I wanted to be with her and she had said to me, "You are too little to be going where I am going."
     My sister hadn't told me she was leaving home, she had simply left and I didn't understand.  It had hurt me a lot but still I hadn't asked any questions.  I wasn't in the habit of asking questions.  I could only try to understand the best I could.  No one understood the crises that had entered into my life and I couldn't tell anyone.
     It had been quite a bit later I was to learn my stepfather wouldn't leave my sister be and she had moved away to get away from him.
     I guess after my sister left I went berserk.  Things didn't go too well for me.  I was alone and didn't know what to do.  I missed my sister terribly.  I was feeling my stepfather didn't want me, anyway not the way I wanted him to want me.  At that time I was thinking he would like to catch me home alone.  I had no friends of my own age.  I didn't have any friends of any age.  It was very seldom I would see my mother for I would usually be in bed asleep before they came home.  I found sleep to be my main escape from everything that was happening in my life.
     If only someone had noticed or paid some attention to me instead of spending so much time in the tavern, maybe, just maybe I would of had a chance.  But then, they didn't understand any more than I did.
     Most of the nights my mother and Ed stayed out late at a tavern a friend of theirs owned.  So it wasn't very hard for me to do whatever I wanted to in the evenings.  So after it had gotten dark on the evening of August 7, not much more than a week after my sister had left and less than three months out of the reform school, I stole my uncles new pickup truck.   My uncle was on vacation somewhere and I knew he always left the keys in the truck during the night.
     When I had gotten into the truck, I had no intention of going for a "joy ride."  I was going out west somewhere and start a new life of my own.
     I got into the truck not knowing any more in how to drive than I did when a year before I had stolen the car back at the juvenile home.  But some way I had managed to back the truck out from in back of the shop and head west out of town.  If I had known then my sister was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, several miles to the east I would have went there instead of going west.
     It was a half ton Chevy truck.  The gas tank was full but I had no idea where I could get gas at when I needed it.  I sure didn't have much money on me.
     I headed west, not knowing where I was going.  The furthest west I had been was to Omaha, when Bobby and I had ran away from the juvenile home when I was thirteen.  Omaha was about a hundred fifty miles.  Beyond that, I had only seen in the movies.
     The pavement of U.S. Highway 30 was very narrow, it was late in the evening and it was dark.  I was in constant fear I would sideswipe a car or truck going in the opposite direction.  This caused me to drive on the far right edge of the pavement.  I had been driving so close to the edge of the pavement that when an oncoming car passed me I swerved slightly dropping my rear wheel off of the pavement.  I had quickly jerked the truck back onto the pavement causing the truck to cross the pavement and down into the ditch.  After following the ditch for several feet the truck shot back upon the highway.  Once back upon the highway the truck came to a stop, with the rear of the truck in the eastbound lane and the front of it in the westbound lane.  If the engine hadn't stalled, I probably would have shot on across the highway and into the ditch on the other side.  But as it was, the engine stalled right there in the middle of the highway.  I didn't know it then but I had lost the spare tire somewhere in the ditch and twisted the truck frame so bad the rear wheels didn't track with the front wheels.
     I was pretty shaken up as I restarted the engine and turned the truck westward.  I had only gone thirty miles from home and I didn't see any reason to go back.
     By the time it was getting daylight I was getting fairly tired.  I was looking for a place where I could pull off the road and get some sleep when I seen two men standing by the side of the road with bags at their feet.  I stopped and asked them if they would like a ride and they told me they did.
     After I had driven a few more miles, I guess they could see I was pretty tired or that my driving wasn't too good, one of them offered to drive.  From there on, they drove and I sat between them, sleeping off and on.  Even better, when we needed gas they bought it.  For they knew I had stolen the truck.
     We were still driving west on U.S. 30, about forty, fifty miles east of Cheyenne, Wyoming when one of the strangest things that had ever happened in my life, happened.  We met my uncle's Cadillac headed east.  I had spotted him about a hundred feet in front of us, only seconds before he passed us going in the opposite direction.
     My cousin had been driving, my aunt was in the front seat beside him, my uncle was in the back.  When I had first spotted them my uncle was hanging out the window waving his left arm at us.  As they passed us, I turned and looked out the rear window of the truck.  I seen my cousin turn in the highway and start after us.  The way he was driving it didn't take but a few minutes to catch up and pass us.  With my uncle now hanging out the other window waving at us to stop.
     I was sitting between the two hitch-hikers.  The driver said, "What's wrong with that idiot?  He acts like he wants us to stop."
     I told the driver, with a nervous voice, "You had better stop.  That's my uncle."  Right about then, I had wished I was anywhere but there.
     I was scared out of my wits.  My uncle was a big man, so was my cousin.  They both looked real mad as they approached the truck.  I thought they were going to tear me apart when they got their hands on me.  But their anger wasn't directed at me as I was soon to find out.  They had thought the hitch-hikers had kidnaped me and had stolen their truck.  The hitch-hikers were fairly big men.  They were a lot older and bigger than I was so I must have looked sort of puny sitting there between them.
     My uncle had gone to the driver's side of the truck, my cousin to the other side.  They had jerked the doors open and they each jerked a hitch-hiker out.
     I thought they were going to kill them, until I realized they thought the hitch-hikers had kidnaped me and stole their truck.  I had jumped out of the truck on the driver's side and started crying and screaming at my uncle, "They didn't kidnap me!  They didn't kidnap me!  I stole the truck!  Please, please stop!  I stole the truck!"
     They had let the hitch-hikers go.  They hadn't even apologized to them.  They left them standing there by the side of the highway.  But then, the hitch-hikers knew I had stolen the truck and that it belonged to my uncle.
     My cousin got into the truck and turned it around and headed east.  My uncle took me back to his car and told me to get in the back.
     The trip home was not very pleasant.  My uncle had asked where the spare tire to his truck was.  He said something like, "What did you do, sell my damn spare tire?"  To me, selling his spare tire was worse than taking his truck  I was crying, my face was wet with tears as I tried to explain how I had ran off of the road and it must have fallen out of the truck.  That is when he notice the truck was not tracking down the highway properly.  Then he did get mad.  No, the trip home had not been too pleasant.
     Getting home wasn't all that great either.  My uncle must have called ahead, for Ed was waiting for me when I got home.  When I had walked in the door he was all over me.
     He had a chance to take one swing at me before my mother was between us.  "You lay another hand on that boy and you'll never live in this house again."  She had angrily yelled at him.  It had been the only time in all of the weeks I had been there my mother had really stood up to him.
     Needless to say, I lost my job with my uncle.  Other than that, things pretty much went the way they had been.  I was pretty much left alone to fend for myself.
     I got another job and by the end of the month (three weeks after returning home from Wyoming) I had been able to save up enough money to have Mr. Nelson at the airport fly me up to the training school.
     It had been on August 26, a Friday, when I had Mr. Nelson fly me to the training school, a mile or so west of Eldora.  I hadn't planed on landing but once we were over the school I asked Mr. Nelson if he could land near the school somewhere.  The only place he could land was in a freshly cut oats field, along side of the highway west of the orientation building.  A county road separated that field from the state property.
     He had landed there, east to west, going away from the institution, so when he was at the far end of the field he had to turn around and taxi the Cessna 150 east, back towards the institution.
     Stopping at the east end of the field I had gotten out and ran across the highway towards my cottage.
     Arriving there, it was about one o'clock in the after noon and all of the boys were in the work detail assembly area so I had to change my destination to that area as soon as I had realized what time it was.
     As I had ran across the assembly area I had seen several boys I knew and Mr. Parker.  I was running straight towards Mr. Parker when he turned and saw me.  As I had ran up to him I could tell he was happy to see me.  I told him, and by the way I was acting, how happy I was to see him.  I guess for a fifteen year old boy I had acted pretty childish for I had even thrown my arms around him and hugged him.
     I had told him I had flown up in an airplane to see him.  Though I didn't mention the idea of landing hadn't occurred to me until we had been circling the training school.
     The usual procedure for anyone visiting at the training school was to check through the  administration offices but in my excitement I completely bypassed that procedure.  After all, the way I felt, I was only coming home to visit.  This was my home, I had a right to see anyone I wanted to see.  Of course, I also knew I could leave any time I wanted to leave, which made a big difference.
     Yes, the visit had been like "Home Coming" to me.  There wasn't the usual fears I had about the training school.  For in my mind, I felt good about being there, I knew I was no longer a "Student" and no one there could hurt me.
     Some of the boys, maybe a half a dozen of them, crowded around me, slapping me on the back, hugging me, I hugging them back.  It wasn't like when I had been there as a "Student," I was a lot more open.  I was happy to see everyone and in a way I had missed them.
     I could only stay a few minutes for all of the boys had to go to work.  So my visit had only been about fifteen minutes, could have been as much as twenty minutes, before I knew I would have to say "Good-bye" to everyone.
     I had noticed several of the work details had already left or were leaving the assembly area when I had joyfully asked Mr.  Parker, "Where's Laddie?"  Of course that had been sort of a stupid question to ask.  Laddie could be anywhere the way that dumb little dog had free run of the training school.
     A hush fell among the boys.  The expression had changed on Mr. Parker's face.  The smile was gone now.  He told me he was very sorry but a few weeks after I left he had to take Laddie to the veterinarian and how they had thought it was best they put Laddie to sleep.
     It seems Laddie had become listless, wouldn't eat, he wouldn't even play with the other boys.  He didn't really say what was wrong with Laddie but from what he had told me, I knew.  Laddie was a lot like me.  When I had left he lost the only friend he felt he had.  He would go to the butcher shop every day and wait at the door, after a time when I didn't come out he would go away.  At times he would go to my cottage and lay on the grass where we use to play together.
     I knew what was wrong with Laddie and it hurt for I felt it was all my fault for there had been nothing wrong with him before I had left.  So when the tears eased from my eyes and trickled down my cheeks, all of the boys and Mr. Parker understood.  I had lost one of my best friends.
     But there had been a lot of things they didn't see.  The real feelings and thoughts I was having.  It was all my fault they had put Laddie to sleep.  I had made a choice between going home or staying with Laddie and I had thought of myself first.  How quickly I had forgotten Laddie, only to remember my little friend when I came back.  How I could have taken him home with me but didn't.
     I don't know if Mr. Nelson had noticed the change in me when I climbed back in the plane and fastened my seat belt.  I had been happy and laughing when he had last seen me.  As I had walked on the way back to the plane I had been openly crying.  As I had crossed the highway, I had tried to wipe the tears from my eyes and my face so Mr. Nelson wouldn't see.
     I was trying to bury the hurt I was feeling, like I had buried all of the other hurts that had faced me over the years.  I tried to put Laddie in that special place in my mind where all of the other hurts dwelled.  A place that was hard for me to see or even think about.  A place, so I thought, where I could keep things that would never hurt me again.
     The flight home to Nevada had been quite that afternoon for I was busy, frantically trying to forget Laddie.  Putting him in that little crowed room in my mind.
     The next morning when I woke up was Saturday, August 27.  By now Laddie was safely tucked away.  An event, so neatly tucked away with all of the other events that could never hurt me again.  So I thought.
     That day, in Nevada, had been a nice sunny day.  I had spent the morning sleeping late.  The rest of the day, still not knowing anyone my own age, I walked or sat alone in the woods south of town.  Something I did quite often.
     Many times I would sit there in the woods thinking.  I guess I did that most anywhere.  That day though, I had sat in the woods thinking not of the future for there was nothing there for me but my thoughts were more of my life at that time.  I don't suppose it is necessary to say my thoughts were not very happy ones.
     As I was laying there on the ground, under a tree, hearing the sounds of an airplane I glanced up in the sky and seen an airplane.  I watched the plane as it traversed it's way in the sky until it disappeared behind a distant tree.
     In my mind, as I watched the plane in the sky, I was up there in the seat of the airplane.  How, if I was up there, I would fly off to some distant place.  I thought of some of the things I could do, and the places I could go, only if I had an airplane.
     I knew I could fly airplane for I had paid very close attention to Mr. Nelson as he had showed me all of the things I needed to know.
     It happen about a week before school started, where I would of had a chance to meet other kids my own age.  Where I might of had my mind on other things, other than what I was thinking.
     Maybe if I could have been with my sister more.  Maybe, maybe, so many maybes.  There were so many points in my life, if I had only turned the other way or walked on the other side of the street, the rest of my life may have been so different.
     This one point in my life, if only I hadn't done what I did that night my life would have been so different and would have gone down another trail.  To where I don't know.  Maybe, just maybe, a lot of crises in my life that were to happen, would never of happened.
     As I have mentioned before, most of the evenings my mother and stepfather stayed out late at a tavern a friend of theirs owned.  So it wasn't hard for me to head for the airport that night when it had started getting dark.  I had figured I would be back home long before my parents were and they nor anyone else would ever know.

Airplane similar to the one Larry Eugene tried to fly.
Two Newspaper Articles About Airplane

     The airport was about two miles west of town.  The main building and hangers sat back from the highway, about a quarter of a mile.
     I had jumped on my bicycle and headed for the airport.  I couldn't take my bike all of the way there for I was going the back way to the airport and not use the highway.
     I knew of an old abandon road that ran parallel, about quarter of a mile south of old U.S. Highway 30, that ran within about a half mile of the airport.  That was where I was going to ride my bike as far as I could.  Then leave it at the end of the road and run the rest of the way across the fields.
     As I rode down the streets I had the street lights to see by but when I had gotten on the old road there hadn't been any light except for the moon and the trees along the road blocked out most of that light.
     About four, five hundred feet down the road I knew the bridge was out but it only spanned a small creek I knew I could ride my bike down into.  Coming to the creek, I cautiously picked my way across it.  Then up the other side I got back on the road and rode my bike as far as I could to the end of the road.  From there I ran as hard as I could, slightly angling to the south to pass well south of Mr. Nelson's house which sat about a quarter, to a third of a mile east of the main building of the airport.
     It hadn't taken me much more than fifteen minutes from the time I had left home to get to the airport.  I had arrived at the airport at the far south end of the north-south runway.  (The only runway the airport had.)  The plane I wanted I knew was parked near the hangers almost three quarters of a mile to the north.
     I could see there were no lights in or around any of the airport buildings.  Even the driveway leading to the highway was dark.  Looking towards Mr. Nelson's house, I could see all of the lights there were out.  This told me they had gone to bed, or even better, out for the evening.  After all it was Saturday night.
     I wanted to get the airplane up and back without anyone knowing I had done it.  I wasn't trying to steal the plane, only fly it for a while and then bring it back.  The airplane I wanted to take was the one I had always been taken up in.  For I felt I knew how to fly that one.
     As I had approach the hangers I seen the plane I wanted was tied down about forty feet in front of the main building, facing west away from Mr. Nelson's house.  It was a Cessna 150.  It had been easy to spot in the dark.
     Going up to the plane, I untied the ropes that held it down and removed the chocks from it's wheels.  Always glancing towards Mr. Nelson's house, watching for a light to come on.  I felt if Mr. Nelson heard me, he would first turn on a light before coming out and this would warn me to take off running for home.
     Making a quick circle around the plane I checked it out the best I could in the dark.  I knew the gas tank was full for whenever a plane was landed at the field it was serviced before it was taken to another area and tied down.
     Going to the right side of the plane I opened the door and climbed in.  Climbing over the first seat I sat down in the pilot's seat.  Whenever I had gone up before I had sat in the other seat but this time I was going to be the pilot.
     I turned on the cabin light and the ignition switch.  Making a quick check of my gauges, I then reached up and set the trim for a take-off attitude.  Priming the engine I started it.
     Once the engine was running smoothly, setting the brakes, I jumped out of the plane.  Running to the front side of the office so I could see the highway I had made sure no one driving by had seen anything unusual happening at the airport.  Then I quickly glance towards Mr. Nelson's house.  Satisfied everything was OK, I returned to the plane.
     I felt more at ease now and I was taking more time in doing what I had to do.  Trying to remember everything Mr. Nelson had taught me.  I knew if I got into any trouble, Mr. Nelson wouldn't be there to help me so I had to be sure to do everything right.
     I set the fuel mixture and carburetor de-icing.  Checked oil pressure and temperature. Everything looked good.  So turning the cabin light out I released the brakes, then increasing the RPMs on the engine I locked the right wheel brake and slowly turned the plane to face the runway.  Tensions were slowly mounting as I released the brake and let the plane slowly move towards the runway.
     Earlier as I had ran up to the plane I had dimly made out the wind sock and I could tell there was a slight, almost unnoticeable breeze from out of the northwest.  That meant I would have to taxi to the south end of the runway and take off to the north, over a power line that was some thirty feet or so off of the ground.
     I hadn't thought about the power line in all of my planning.  (Well, my plans were sort of being made on the spur of the moment.)  But still undaunted, I was determined to go.
     At the runway I put a slight pressure on the right brake turning the plane south down the runway.  Mindful of the RPMs I slowly taxied to the south end of the runway.
     At the south end of the runway, I slightly increased the RPMs, locking the right brake, I turned the plane around to face north down the runway.
     I sat there, with the cabin light on once again, going once again over all of the gauges, rechecking the trim etc.
     Turning the cabin light back out I looked down the runway.  It had been hard to see straight ahead, over the nose of the plane but I could just barely make out the main building and hangers to the left of the runway.  I knew I would have to pass well to the east of the buildings and I would have to be well above them to clear the power line at the end of the runway near the highway.
     Locking both brakes again I increased the engine power and then slowly released the brakes.  I had pushed the throttle all of the way in giving me maximum power.
     Whenever Mr. Nelson took me up, he had used about half of the runway but I wanted to use much more than that to be sure I was going fast enough before I left the ground.
     At about the halfway point, I pushed slightly forward on the wheel bringing the tail up a little bit for the plane had started bouncing trying to leave the ground too soon.  About two thirds of the way down the runway I had pulled slightly back on the wheel.  I could feel the wheels leaving the ground shortly before the engine had stalled.
     The plane had hit the ground hard and I was trying frantically to slow the plane down, fearful of putting the brakes on too hard for fear of flipping the plane over on it's nose, seeing the fence at the end of the runway rushing towards me.  It had been as though I had been "Willing" the plane to stop more than anything I was doing.
     I had been very near the fence by the time I felt I could put full pressure on the brakes and bring the plane to a compete stop.
     Quickly getting out of the plane and staying low, I ran to the tail of the plane and looked towards the house.  I couldn't believe it, no light.
     Getting back into the plane, I managed to get the engine running again.  With the engine running smoothly I turned the plane and once again taxied to the far end of the runway for another try.
     At the south end of the runway I quickly spun the plane once again to the north.  Without stopping I pushed the throttle all of the way in feeling the plane surge forward.
     About five or six hundred feet down the runway the engine once again stalled and the plane came to rest about a third of the way down the runway, in full view of the house.  I had glanced off through the right hand side of the windshield and seen the house was still dark.
     I had tried several times to restart the engine but failing to get it started and fearing Mr. Nelson by now would have heard all of the noise I had been making, I decided to give it up and go back home.  By now I had lost all interest in flying.  Well, for the time being anyeay.  I hadn't actually flown the airplane but only moved it around the field a little bit.
     I didn't feel wrong in what I had done.  Even if I had flown the plane and had been able to get it back safely I wouldn't have felt wrong about it.  Today there is some question in my mind as to whether I could have landed safely on a darkened airfield or even if I could have found the airfield once I was up.
     No, I didn't feel wrong about any of it.  No more than I did when I had taken the superintendent's car back at the juvenile home or when I had ran away from the institutions.  In my world things seemed a lot different than what most people felt about things like that.  It was like I knew I shouldn't do it without asking put I felt they wouldn't let me do it if I asked them, or they would stop me if they knew I was doing it.  Wrong for it was stealing?  Not really, for in my world that never existed.  I know it is hard for others to understand but I lived in a different world.  I couldn't see where I was harming anyone else.
     I was in luck for no one was at home when I got there.  I was in bed and sound asleep when my parents got home.  So you can imagine the surprise to my parents when the sheriff came the next morning to arrest me for "Stealing" the airplane.  They had said I had damaged the plane and some other things.  But I hadn't done any of that.  It had been sitting out in the open and I hadn't hit anything.  Many months later I was to find out, the airplane didn't belong to Mr. Nelson but to someone else, someone who's life would once again cross mine, in somewhat of a negative way.
     I had been home for about three and a half months.  Before the week was out, I would be back in the Iowa Training School for Boys.

Newspaper Article About Taking Uncle's Truck
and
Two Articles About Trying To Fly The Airplane