She laughed. “If you see it, tell me where I am. I have no idea. Who wrote that? Was he from Iowa?”
“William Kinsella wrote Shoeless Joe. He was born in Canada, but attended the Iowa Writer’s Workshop in Iowa City, and he said he loved Iowa.”
“Dan Gable, wrestler. Famous person from Iowa,” Dr. Drew Peterson (History) said.
Roger said, “He’s probably only famous in Iowa.”
“And in Oklahoma,” Drew replied.
“To any list of significant Iowans, I would add the name of Norman Borlaug.” Amanda Charles (Administrative Assistant, History) said. “He won a Nobel Prize for his work in agriculture. Most people don’t know his name, let alone that he was born on a farm near Cresco, but his research on ways to grow crops with higher yields has saved the lives of a billion people. At least that’s what I heard on the news once. So he ought to be remembered, even if he isn’t famous.”
“Hear! Hear!”
“A toast to Norman Borlaug!”
“Don’t forget Grant Wood, Iowan painter and artist!” Dr. Heather Norton (Art History) said. “I’m impressed there was a minority of athletes on your list, Dr. Harper. Sports are so big in Iowa.”
“Speaking of big in sports —,” Dr. Harper said.
His wife Betty said, “Here we go!” then laughed and shook her head.
Dr. Harper smiled and waved her remark away like it was a fly and continued, “Did you know about a regional professional baseball team that used to have its home base here in northeastern Iowa one hundred years ago? They were called the Fat Men’s Amusement Company and were very popular back in the day. Every player weighed over 300 pounds. Baby Bliss was the biggest attraction, a giant of a man, weighing in at 640 pounds. Reports are that he sat on three chairs at the dinner table.”
“I think I saw that episode on public TV once, the show about antiques.” Tess said. “A woman had one of her dad’s uniform shirts. It was huge!”
“Yep. That’s the one.”
Everett Burton, the owner of The Midnight Airship (who lived in a second floor apartment above the restaurant) brought two plastic pitchers of pop over to their table. He was a man of less than average height in his late sixties who always wore a plaid shirt with twill work pants and suspenders, and always wore a baseball cap decorated with The Airship logo at a rakish angle, indoors or out, even when he wasn’t at his restaurant, which was a rare occasion. When business was slow during the middle of the afternoon, you could find him at the end of the lunch counter, reading a Louis L’Amour western. Dr. Harper said, “Great pizza today, Everett!”
“You betcha — thanks! Be sure to tell your friends. Here’s some pop, on the house, my treat, since it’s the holiday season and you are all such good customers of The Midnight Airship.”
This was another aspect of Everett’s reliable routine — he was a tenacious marketer when it came to asking people to mention his restaurant. No matter how many times you visited, even if you were in the restaurant seated around a table with every single person you knew in the world, Everett would ask you to “tell your friends” about your latest experience at The Airship. And his strategy seemed to be working well, because the downtown restaurant always did a consistently good business, even after the Darisford Inn and its Barrow Heights American Grille arrived in town.
Leaning to support his weight on the back of a chair, Everett addressed the group. “So I hear you’re talking about interesting aspects of Iowa history. Did you know that in 1903 in Van Meter, west of Des Moines, creditable eyewitnesses reported seeing a mysterious flying creature, although some said they saw two creatures soaring through the night. Reports on what it was also differed. Some said it was an eight foot tall pterosaur with a wingspan of sixteen to eighteen feet, a holdover from the days of the dinosaurs. Some said it was a half human, half animal beast with huge bat wings. Some said it was Satan himself. But whatever it was, it emerged from a played-out coal mine outside town one night, spread its huge skin-covered wings, and flew all over town while glowing with an unholy light. For three nights, whatever it was, pterosaur or demon, the flying monster terrorized the small town. Local men tried to shoot it down, without success. After the short reign of terror, whatever it was, it disappeared, vanishing without a trace forever. Except for a plaster cast that was made of a giant footprint with three toes.”
“I read a book about that and other strange sightings in Iowa,” Roger said. “There were newspaper reports around the state in the 1880s of people seeing a flying serpent with a body like an alligator and horns on its head, covered all over in shiny scales. One that was witnessed landing in a corn field.”
Everett nodded. “Don’t you know, Iowa seems to be the place for seeing strange things in the sky. There’s another story that hardly anyone remembers anymore that sure made a big impact on me. A story verified at the time by dozens of people in dozens of locations. Starting in late 1896 and for six months after, all across the country from California to Michigan to New York, Texas to Iowa, there were newspaper reports of airships flying across the sky after dark. Airships consisting of a balloon with a cigar-shaped cabin tethered underneath, powered by propellers, equipped with powerful search lights on the front, traveling at speeds faster than the fastest trains. Multiple passengers were spotted in the passenger cabin, at times, but not always. Each one seemed to be a different design and size, varying in size — some fifty feet, others up to two hundred and fifty feet long. There was a report in an 1897 newspaper of several citizens and a couple of trainmen in the western portion of Sioux City spotting something in the night sky, the unknown flying machine traveling, as the witnesses put it, ‘in a bee line a uniform distance from the earth.’ On each side, the airship had a row of lit lanterns. So not a hot air balloon, which was the only known mode of flying at the time.
“Keep in mind, this was a decade before the Wright Brothers would achieve success with their flying machine at Kitty Hawk. It was an era when people talked a lot about the invention of flying machines, with everyone expecting to read about the first manned flight in the next day’s newspaper. But nobody had accomplished it yet.
“In 1897, one of the midnight airships crash landed outside Aurora, Texas, killing the pilot. Even though the body didn’t look quite human, the townspeople gave him a Christian burial in the town’s cemetery. Later, a rancher and his son, also in Texas, reported meeting two pilots from a different airship, who looked like normal people this time, an airship that had stopped and landed to pick up some water on their property. In the course of their conversation, the ranchers learned that five of these airships were built in a small town located right here in Iowa somewhere. But nobody ever found out where, and after 1897, no one anywhere ever saw those airships flying again. Which may not be such a surprise, since some said the airships belonged to the military. Later events seem to verify that this was an accurate assessment. In the first World War, in 1917 in the skies over Belgium, the story is that Manfred von Richthofen, the German ace known as the Red Baron who shot down over seventy Allied pilots, also shot down a shiny saucer-shaped craft. Another German pilot witnessed the downing, and both aviators testified later that the UFO definitely wasn’t an airplane. At the time, he and the Red Baron thought it was some kind of American invention, but the tiny creatures who ran from the crash and escaped into the forest didn’t look like American pilots. Or humans of any nationality. Was this version 2.0 of the midnight airships? Nobody can say for sure.”
Everett lifted his baseball cap to rub the back of his head. “In 1899, just two years after the nationwide sightings of the original airships, a man here in Iowa named W. Frank Brinton notified the newspaper in Washington, Iowa, not that far south of here, saying that he was going to make a trial flight of his airship at the fairgrounds there, and he was selling rides for a nickel apiece. Before the event, eight thousand people bought tickets to take a ride up in the
air, which would have been a monumental first-in-a-lifetime experience for them. My grandparents bought two of those tickets. I’ve got the ticket stubs upstairs. That’s how I got interested in the story of the midnight airships in the first place, listening to their story.
“But my grandparents didn’t fly that day. Brinton said the delivery of a generator needed to create the hydrogen gas to inflate the balloon portion of his airship hadn’t arrived on time so he was grounded and unable to take off. Some reports say the airship didn’t even show up to the fairgrounds, although my grandparents said they saw it that day. Brinton did try to give people their money back, and also offered to have everyone use their ticket as free admission to his other business venture, a magic lantern show, but it was no good. People were angry, and as the story goes, their profane reaction following the no-show led to an unruly mob tearing the airship apart, people taking souvenir pieces home with them as compensation, leaving only a handful of parts for Brinton to salvage. That plus the ridicule in scathing articles in the local papers afterward concerning Brinton’s failure caused him to abandon flying airships, publicly anyway, and instead focus all his attention on his business of taking the magic lantern show to venues around the country.
“The details of the nationwide flights of the airships flying through the night skies in 1896 remains a mystery to this day. No one knows for sure who the inventor or developer was, no one knows exactly what the construction plans were, or where the airships were built. Or why they completely disappeared after what appeared to be a series of successful test flights.
“It seems like such a shame that people don’t remember any of this.” Smiling, Everett said, “Well, I couldn’t allow such a wonderful occurrence as the flight of Victorian era UFOs built right here in Iowa to be totally forgotten, so that’s why I named my restaurant The Midnight Airship.”
Mia smiled and mentally added. “Be sure to tell your friends.”
Betty Harper said, “I remember hearing that back in the 1950s there were reports of people seeing UFOs over Keokuk, Iowa. Some photos taken too.”
“I’m of the opinion that the flying saucers seen later were the next generation, later developments of the technology launched in 1896,” Everett said. “The airships were UFO version 1.0.”
“That would mean today’s UFOs and the little green men inside aren’t from outer space,” Amanda said. “They couldn’t have crossed galactic space in a propeller-driven airship.”
“Hm-mmm.” Everett nodded and then said, “Interesting to think about, isn’t it.”
Roger said, “Well, according to Iranian newspapers, Edward Snowden has released secret papers exposing the fact that the American government is being run by aliens who live in a network of tunnels under the White House.”
“You made that up!” Grant said.
“No, I didn’t! Someone in Iran may have made up the story, but I did read about it online.”
Dr. Harper said, “That’s not the only sort of mystery to be found in this area. Some come from under the ground. Over one hundred years ago, they dug up giant bones in a mound not five miles from here, and also across the river over in Wisconsin, near Platteville.”
“That was a hoax,” Dr. Helen Travers (Biochemistry) said.
“I don’t know,” Dr. Gilbert Dirks (Geology) said. “I don’t think they all were hoaxes. In the 1890s the Smithsonian Museum sponsored a dig in Poplar Bluff, Missouri that unearthed over 100 skeletons of giants in a valley outside town. The height of these giants averaged nearly eight feet tall. And in the early 1900s there was a giant nine-foot skeleton on display in a store window on Main Street in Eldora, Iowa that had been dug up under an effigy mound. A local doctor examined the remains and reported his findings in the local newspaper. He found the very large skull had a double row of teeth, with the bone making up the cranium at three-eighths-inch thick, fifty percent thicker than a normal skull. His impression was that the skeleton was many centuries old, a person who had evidently trained for strength or athletics, with well developed extremities.”
“It was common knowledge in nineteenth century America that giants had once lived in North America,” Dr. Dan Bergman (American History) said. “Presidents like Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln wrote about them. Before he was elected, Abraham Lincoln wrote a paper on Niagara Falls, saying that the falls were ancient and that giants had once been around to gaze on them.”
Everett said, “There were many newspaper reports written in different locations about the discoveries of giant skeletons back around the turn of the twentieth century. In most cases, they reported in detail how and where the bones were dug up, and afterward, a local medical doctor would measure the skeleton to determine a height — one was a thirteen foot giant, most were at least eight feet tall. Unfortunately, we can’t view those remains today because in every instance, the Smithsonian showed up and carted all of those the bones away, never to be seen again.”
Drew said, “Yeah, they put the bones into a wooden crate and sent them to an Indiana Jones-type government warehouse. Never to be seen again.”
“There are some people who say wherever they find giant bones, there’s a inter-dimensional portal somewhere nearby,” Dr. Harper said,
Mia looked at him. “A stargate. You’re saying there’s a stargate near here.”
“So close!” Jan said. “There’s mounds near McLeod, not even thirty miles east of here, and Harper’s Ferry is thirty-five miles to the north. That’s at least two stargates right in our back yard!”
“Wouldn’t that be cool?” Tess said to Grant. “Wonder where the gateway would take you?”
“Other worlds, other dimensions,” Grant said.
Tess said, “I want to go!”
“Me too!” Betty said. “Wouldn’t that be an adventure!”
“Why assume it would be a great adventure?” Mia thought to herself. “I wouldn’t. Not all experiences are pleasant. Or safe.”
Roger said, “In Arizona, the Paiute Indians used to tell stories of the Si-Te-Cah, white-skinned, red-haired giants with six fingers and six toes, who came through stargates and taught the people to practice black magic. Also taught them cannibalism too, because the giants were cannibals themselves. They smelled so bad — they had a horrible stench that was pungent like skunk smell, but with an overlay of rotting flesh. These giants were HUGE, and their hunger was as huge as their size, so they soon consumed all the land, ate up all the food. After that, they resorted to pulling the heads off people and sucking the blood out of them and munching on their bones.”
“Ewww!” said several people together.
Smiling, Dr. Cate Belham (Psychology) said, “Everyone knows these stories about giants are myths, an attempt to come to grips with their fear of being eaten by predators.”
“Haha!” Dr. Anthony Milburn (Chemistry) said. “Don’t bring up Freudian theories about the connections between myth and religion. Too soon after I ate!”
“That story’s a myth,” Helen said. “It couldn’t be true.”
Everett said, “I don’t know. I’ve heard a story told by veterans coming back from Afghanistan, that in 2003 an entire special forces squad trying to capture a giant was attacked and killed by it, and then eaten. Every single one. A team of special operations soldiers had to be sent in afterward to deal with it and the fifteen foot spear it had used. The report is that the giant they killed was thirteen feet tall, weighed over half a ton, six fingers on each hand, six toes each foot, with pale white skin and red hair. And it stunk to high heaven too. Another fact mentioned in this story — if you don’t cut off the giant’s head, it can come back to life.”
Grant said, “There can be only one.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Roger said. “Wait just a minute! We’re talking about these supernatural fictions like they really happened. I don’t believe in the supernatural. Whenever the
details are investigated, really investigated, there’s always a rational explanation that doesn’t involve giants or little green men, or any kind of supernatural spooks. There’s always an explanation.”
Several people shook their head in disagreement.
“Roger, some things do resist being explained away as nothing but normal,” Grant said. “The supernatural world is real. There have been too many discoveries, too many verified stories. There is more to the world than logic and reason.”
Jan spoke up. “Speaking of supernatural — from what I hear, you’re psychic, Mia.”
Blushing at being placed in the center of everyone’s attention, she said, “What? No. No. Well, something — sorta. My students tell me that they think I ‘vibe.’” (Mia signed air quotes here.) “But I can’t pick up messages about a person from holding an object they own, and I don’t see visions of what has happened to people who are lost or missing. However, sometimes I do hear what people think about me when I shake their hand. Not reading their thoughts exactly, I just hear something about how they’re evaluating me — in my mind, you understand, not with my ears. Often, I can tell by holding something if I will be allergic to it, which is extremely helpful since I am allergic to soy, an ingredient which can be difficult to discover just by reading labels. Also, I get feelings about things, like when I get the notion that I should travel on Highway 30 across the state and avoid I-80, and later I see on the news there was an accident that caused significant backups on the other road. Or sometimes I’ve gotten nudges to double-check my work for errors and then just in nick of time, find I’ve made a massive, stupid mistake, and fix it before publication. I’m good at looking for, and finding, something that I’ve lost. Not every time, but a lot of the time. And I think the messages from these vibes skip over my conscious mind.”
Seeing puzzled looks, Mia explained. “I mean I find myself saying things that I didn’t know I would say ahead of time, and then discover that the words have an impact on the person I say them to. In one unfortunate example, I asked a student about her grandmother — and then thought to myself, ‘Why did I say that?’ Only to find out that her grandmother has just died, alone, and no one had discovered the body for over a week. Another time, when I was about twelve or thirteen, I stood with my hand on a hackberry tree that was in the alley behind our house for several long minutes, having no idea why I was doing that. The thought even crossed my mind while I was standing there, ‘Why am I doing this?’ And I didn’t know what the answer was. Then the next day, the utility company came along and chopped the top of that tree in half from crown to trunk, to keep the branches from ever contacting the power lines.”
No Geek Rapture for Me_I'm Old School Page 4
