Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 5, 1993 TAG: 9307050044
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: HOLIDAY
SOURCE: ARNOLD HAMILTON DALLAS MORNING NEWS
DATELINE: BOISE CITY, OKLA. LENGTH: Long
As for their own Army Air Corps, well, that was another matter.
In an episode that seems scripted for "F Troop" or "McHale's Navy," a B-17 crew somehow veered off course on the night of July 5, 1943. It dropped six 100-pound practice bombs near the county courthouse, scaring townspeople, costing the navigator his job and nearly causing the crew to be court-martialed.
Now, 50 years later, bemused Boise City residents will commemorate the event that put their town on the map with a special Independence Day celebration that includes the dedication of a memorial bearing a 100-pound surplus bomb from the war era.
"I don't believe there's been anything that exciting, before or since," said Norma Gene Young, Boise City's former newspaper editor. "There have been a few shootings, but nothing like this."
As anticipation built toward the event, there was considerable disappointment that none of the surviving crew members will join the lighthearted festivities.
Some are unable because of health problems to make the trip to Boise City, in the western end of the Oklahoma Panhandle. Others say they don't want more attention drawn to their inauspicious debut as American bombers.
"I don't understand why they feel that way," said H.G. Goeringer, the plane's radio operator, who is retired and living in Southern California. "I thought it was pretty funny at the time and still do."
As it turned out, the B-17 crew became one of America's most highly decorated outfits in World War II. Not only were its members each awarded nearly a dozen medals and citations, but they also were chosen to lead 800 planes from the 8th Air Force on the first daylight bombing raid of Berlin in March 1944.
But less than a year earlier, after an ill-fated training mission over the Oklahoma and Texas Panhandles, the 10-man crew out of Dalhart Army Air Base feared that it would be drummed out of the military. And the 1,144 residents of Boise City breathed a collective sigh of relief when one bomb narrowly missed a gasoline transport truck and another fell about a foot short of the First Baptist Church.
Hurlie and Hazel Reed and their infant son were sound asleep about 12:30 a.m. when the quiet night was shattered by a long whistle and explosion.
Hurlie Reed, now a retired butcher, said he jumped up, pulled on his pants and ran outside to see what was happening. Hazel Reed, the former county clerk, quickly joined him. Together, they watched as an airplane, its lights visible against the dark sky, slowly circled their town and headed back toward the Cimarron County Courthouse.
"Every time they'd make a big, wide circle, they'd drop a bomb," Hurlie Reed said. "It made plenty of noise. You definitely knew they were doing a pretty good job by where they hit."
Sheriff to the rescue
Young, the county sheriff, lived in a third-floor courthouse apartment. He knew immediately that Dalhart trainees had somehow gotten off course.
He raced down the street to the telephone office, where he roused the operator, and they called the base.
Meanwhile, up in the B-17, the navigator didn't realize that the plane had flown about 40 miles north of the base to Boise City, rather than 20 miles northeast to Conlen, Texas, to their target range.
Once he and the other officers saw the four lights around the Cimarron County Courthouse - one on each end, creating the illusion of an `X' - they believed that they had reached their target.
"The investigators took pictures of the courthouse at night and put them next to the pictures of the target area," said Fort Worth resident Sam Assimotos, who succeeded the crew's navigator the next morning in a disciplinary move. "They couldn't tell which was which."
Goeringer, the radio operator, said that after the crew dropped three bombs, he was contacted by the Dalhart tower.
"They asked me to check with the navigator and bombardier to see if they knew where they were," he said. "They were positive."
Moments later, Dalhart radioed him again.
"They kept telling me that somebody's on the wrong target," said Goeringer, who was 22 at the time. "But when you're an enlisted man and you're talking to the [plane's] officers, you don't argue with them. You have to take their word."
`Remember Boise City!'
Then, suddenly, the lights in Boise City went out. An employee of the electric company, Frank Garrett, had raced to the office and shut down the power, effectively ending the target practice.
"They [the B-17 officers] kind of thought they had hit the main switch and they thought that put all the lights out," said Anthony Foti, the aircraft engineer that night who now is retired and living in Jamestown, N.Y.
The crew was ordered back to Dalhart, and an investigation began.
Residents said nervous military brass descended on Boise City the next morning to survey the damage. They were relieved to learn that the bombs - 4 pounds of explosive and 96 pounds of sand - caused only minor damage, mostly just leaving significant craters.
Meanwhile, some wag posted a sign at the base that read: "Remember the Alamo, remember Pearl Harbor and, for God's sake, remember Boise City!"
According to Assimotos, a retired lieutenant colonel, the investigation focused on the ousted navigator, but the other crew members did not avoid the military's wrath: They were given the choice of heading directly into combat or facing court-martial.
They chose combat.
Assimotos said they flew to St. Louis to pick up a new B-17 to take into combat in Europe. En route to Bangor, Maine, where they were to refuel before crossing the Atlantic Ocean, some crew members decided to "buzz" their hometowns to let home folk know that they were headed to battle.
`Where are we?'
It resulted in more trouble: Flying a less-than-direct route to Bangor, they ran out of gas and were forced to land on a partly completed rural runway.
Assimotos said he jumped out of the plane and ran over to a farmer, riding his tractor nearby.
"Where are we?" Assimotos asked.
"You're in Berlin," the farmer said.
"Hell, I knew we hadn't flown across the Atlantic," Assimotos said recently. "It turned out we were in Berlin, New Hampshire."
In Boise City, the bombing has remained a topic of conversation for five decades. For years, residents believed that they lived in the only city in North America to be "bombed" during World War II. Researchers say it now appears that other towns also may have been targeted with "friendly fire."
Still, in Boise City, even in the first hours afterward, residents said they were not angry with the crew.
Indeed, in a move that reflected the patriotic fervor of the times, the mayor issued a statement the next morning, praising the bombers for their accuracy. All but one bomb landed within 93 feet of the courthouse.
The admiration continues today.
"We'd like to have them back and pin some medals on them - not so much for putting Boise City on the map, but for being involved in the war effort and going on to great accomplishment," said lawyer Stan Manske, who is helping to coordinate this year's festivities.
"This wasn't started in any way to tear down the guys in that plane. It's because it's a fun part of our history.
"If we don't memorialize it, it could be lost."
by CNB