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A
year ago I received a copy of Paul Gleason’s "A Pictorial
History," and I found the pictures of Mark Holland’s
buzzing of Lincoln. Regrettably, the author did not make
attribution to the photographer for these or any other
photographs, and perhaps this was not possible, as so many dated
back so far. In any case, I thought your readers might enjoy a
story behind these pictures.
My
father, Charles M. Stringer, had a photography studio on the
second floor of the Marcucci building in the ’30s and ’40s.
During Mark’s later high school years he worked for my father
and at the same time developed an interest in flying. After our
entry into World War II, Mark entered the Army Air Corps and
flight school. At some point Mark told dad that if the opportunity
ever came that he could "buzz" Lincoln, he would
telegram dad the night before. Dad agreed he’d have his Speed
Grafix loaded and snap the pictures.
As
you can guess, Lincoln was not the only town being buzzed. There
was a general order prohibiting this, but there was little the
military could really do. Pilots were needed overseas, and buzzing
your hometown would not ground a qualified pilot.
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[Mark Holland]
One
night the telegram came, something about seeing Lincoln soon. Dad
knew it meant Mark would buzz the town the next day. My dad told me
to keep all of this to myself, and I was certain I was in on a big
military secret. At the time, I was in the fourth grade at Monroe
Elementary School. My teacher was Miss Hazel Holland, and our
classroom was on the second floor. Miss Holland was a cousin of Mark’s.
Needless
to say, when Mark made his first run the class was out of hand. We
ran to the windows for a grand view of the action. After Mark
finished his runs and the class had quieted down, Miss Holland asked
if anyone knew who was flying that airplane. While I had to fake it,
we all had blank faces. I’m not sure if she suspected it was Mark,
but nothing more was said.
Dad
got the pictures, and these were kept out of circulation until Mark
returned. During the war each kid had his personal hometown heroes,
and Mark was one of mine.
Stan
Stringer
Falls
Church, Va.
dstringer@mgfairfax.rr.com
(5-11-01)
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I
graduated from LCHS in 1960, attended Lincoln College for a year
and then transferred to Illinois State (then Illinois State Normal
University). I taught at Pekin Community High School for 30
years before taking early retirement in 1994. Since then I
have taught technical communication at Southwest Missouri State
University in Springfield, Mo. For more information about my
career and teaching activities, please visit http://www.smsu.edu/english/dlhpages/dlh.html.
The
move to Missouri has increased my appreciation of the diversity of
our society. I always wondered what people meant by having
to deal with "culture shock" in moving to a different
section of the country. Here in the Ozarks, there seems to
be a blend of Midwestern, Southern and Western cultural
influences. Let me cite an example of the Western influence.
Missouri is nicknamed the "Show Me" state, and that
often seems to translate as an attitude of "so
what?" or "prove it." The good thing is
that here rugged individualism is alive and well.
As
a teacher for nearly 37 years, I have been especially interested
in communities composed of students, teachers and
parents. Thus, many of my most vivid Lincoln memories have to
do with school experiences. For example, I attended Jefferson
School from 1949 through 1954 and remember being taught in
fourth, fifth and sixth grades by the principal, Miss
Bernadine Jones. She kept us together as a
class because she had taught most of our parents, aunts and
uncles and so took a special interest in us.
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Those
were the times in which many students regarded teachers with
awe. At the beginning of fourth grade, I was so aware of Miss
Jones' reputation for strictness that on the first day of school I
attempted to avoid her class by enrolling myself in the other
fourth-grade teacher's class. About an hour or so went
by, and I began to relax, thinking I had escaped.
Suddenly, Miss Jones walked briskly into the room. She
sternly asked if I were there and then escorted me to
her classroom-office.
Fortunately,
she did not take me to the nurse's office, where her infamous
wooden paddle prominently hung on the wall, handy for private
lessons. When she took someone for those lessons,
we often heard the results.
For
three years, our class learned values as well as the
"three R’s." In the way she taught and ran
the school, she exemplified discipline and responsibility and got
respect for it.
I
would be interested in exchanging other stories with
classmates. For this reason, I have collaborated
with other LCHS classmates in the creation of an interactive
LCHS Class of 1960 site at http://www.geocities.com/lincolnhigh1960/.
On
behalf of my classmates, I am grateful to Lincolndailynews.com
for helping us use Internet communication as a way to
re-establish our community.
Leigh
Henson
(3-29-01)
(Note:
A link to the Internet site for 1960 graduates of LCHS is
available regularly under "Reunions.")
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Valentine’s
Day brings back memories for all of us — the sweethearts we gave
flowers to or chocolate candy or kind words to our mothers.
Valentine’s
Day for me awakes the memories of being taken hostage in Tehran
that very day. We at the American Embassy in Tehran nicknamed it
the "Valentine's Day Massacre."
At
about 10 a.m., Feb. 14, 1979, three vehicles pulled up at
strategic locations around the embassy compound and opened fire
with machine guns. Iranian fanatics under the Ayatollah Khomeni
were attacking our embassy with the intent to close it and do
serious bodily harm to the occupants, American and Iranian
employees. Our Marine detachment was able to return fire and hold
them off for about three hours, but were outnumbered and
outgunned.
I
was caught under heavy gunfire while setting up a
"secure" telephone system in the embassy administrator's
office on the first floor of the embassy. Through the grace of
God, I was able to get upstairs to my own office, located in our
communications vault, which I was in charge of. My staff were
already in the process of destroying sensitive equipment and
classified documents under the direction of my deputy
communications officer. During this same time frame, as many
employees as possible were making it to the vault, which was also
the embassy's "safe haven" location.
Numerous
firefights were taking place throughout the embassy at this time,
as the Iranians had successfully gotten onto our compound. Some of
our Marines were wounded, some were captured and taken away, and
some people suffered the ultimate — death…
As
our ambassador was doing what he could to assure the safety for as
many as possible, there was no doubt we were going to have to
surrender the embassy.
He
yelled to me, "How much more time do you need?" (to
destroy necessary equipment and documents).
I
told him, "Thirty more minutes," but because of the
atrocities taking place and to save as many lives as possible, we
didn't get that 30 minutes.
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At
that time, I was on one of our HF radio systems informing our
embassy in Kuwait that we were under attack, surrendering the
embassy and for them to inform the Department of State in
Washington, D.C. The ambassador swung open the vault door and the
Iranians busted in, saw me on the radio and bashed me in the head
with an AK-47. As I got hit, I spun the dial on the radio so they
would not know our radio frequency.
When
I regained consciousness, armed Iranians were everywhere and were in
the process of removing us from the vault. As they removed us, they
body-searched us and forcefully took us to a large area to
physically control us. They had us get on our knees with our hands
behind our heads. We were held there for some time and physically
abused at their whim.
We
were later removed to the outside of the embassy and placed in front
of a machine gun that had been set up. Many things took place at
this time that I won't go into, but the international press
(numerous) showed up, and that most likely saved our lives. I had
been injured earlier, besides being hit in the head and again beaten
when taken outside of the embassy. We were later taken to the
ambassador's residence, located on the compound.
Some
employees were released during the next days and weeks, but I did
not leave until all of my staff were safe and accounted for and also
safely gotten out of Tehran.
This
was not my first encounter with terrorism, as I had been kidnapped
in Fort Lamy, Tchad, in 1968. I believe my prior experience in the
Marines, having served in unstable countries prior to being assigned
to Iran, most likely prepared me for what took place.
Of
course, not learning from these experiences, I continued to
volunteer for the trouble spots around the world during the rest of
my career in the Foreign Service.
It
is one Valentine’s Day I will never forget.
[George
A. McKinney, Pharr, Texas]
(2-15-01)
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