This Plane Went Down in the Pacific…

And someone you know was on board.

Douglas A-1 Skyraider (AD-4NA, 126965)

 

You may wonder at first why this post is included on a Western-themed blog. But bear with me. All will be made clear by the time you finish this story.

Sampson wasn’t his real name. It was a nickname affectionately given to him by the nurses at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital where he was born in 1930. Weighing over eleven pounds when he was born, the name seemed appropriate. By the time he was eighteen years old, Sampson stood an imposing six-feet, four-inches tall.

As a young boy, he was a bit of a disciplinary problem. He was held back in middle school because of his poor academic performance, and it’s not even known if he graduated from high school.

Sampson had just turned twenty, a couple of months earlier, when the Korean War started in June of 1950, and it wasn’t long before he was called up in the draft and on his way to Fort Ord east of Monterey, California for basic training. However, after basic training, rather than being shipped overseas as part of a combat unit, Sampson was assigned lifeguard duties at the base pool in Fort Ord where he remained throughout his time in the military. Sampson was a good swimmer and enjoyed his duties as a lifeguard. He would spend his days at the base pool, then he would work as a bouncer in a local bar at night to make some extra cash.

After about a year at Fort Ord, Sampson took some leave to visit his girlfriend in Seattle. Military personnel could travel on any military flight free of charge if they could find one that was headed where they were going. So, finding a plane leaving Fort Ord and heading to Seattle, Sampson secured a seat as a passenger.

After spending a few days with his girlfriend, he had to start making arrangements to get back to Fort Ord, but the only military flight that was leaving the Seattle airport for Fort Ord was a WWII model Douglas AD Skyraider. The Skyraider was a fighter-bomber that was in popular use at the time. The only problem was that it was a single-seat aircraft that was only meant to be occupied by the pilot.

Sampson begged and pleaded with the pilot, a man named Anderson, to let him stow away in the radar compartment of the plane, saying that he didn’t have enough money for a commercial flight and that if he didn’t return to Fort Ord by morning, he would be AWOL. The pilot took pity on him and agreed to let him ride in the radar compartment – if he could fit. It was a small space that wasn’t meant to be occupied by anyone, especially someone as tall as Sampson.

The only opening to the radar compartment was through a hatch on the outside of the plane, so Anderson opened the hatch to let Sampson crawl inside. The pilot closed the hatch while Sampson settled in. It was a tight fit and it would be an uncomfortable ride, especially if they ran into any turbulence along the way, but Sampson said he would be fine and thanked Anderson for the ride back to Fort Ord.

It was during take-off that things started going wrong. Just as the plane was gaining speed to lift off the runway, the hatch to the radar compartment flew open. Sampson tried to reach out of the plane to get a good enough grip on the door to pull it closed, but the wind was so strong, that it pinned the door against the fuselage. Try as he might, he was unable to get the door closed, so he retreated as far back as he could into the little compartment, away from the door. Sampson wasn’t really worried about falling out of the plane, although that was a distinct possibility. There was a much greater concern that had his attention. Because the radar compartment wasn’t meant to carry any people, there was no radio and therefore, no way to contact the pilot. Sampson knew that at their cruising altitude the oxygen would be thin and not able to support him. Normally, when they reach their cruising altitude, the pilot switches on the oxygen pumps which supply oxygen to the rest of the plane, including the radar compartment where Sampson was. But with the hatch stuck open, all of the oxygen would be sucked right out of the plane and he would suffocate.

At some point during the trip, the pilot, Anderson made a chilling discovery. An error had been made during refueling and they didn’t have enough fuel to make it to Fort Ord. Nor did they have enough fuel to return to Seattle. To make matters even worse, Anderson discovered that the oxygen supply had failed. He immediately dropped the plane to a lower altitude so there was sufficient oxygen. At least that problem was solved. He then attempted to radio any nearby airports where he could make an emergency landing. But things had gone from bad to worse because he discovered that the radio wasn’t working. As the plane’s engines started to sputter out of fuel, he knew that they were going to crash into the Pacific.

In the meantime, Sampson had passed out in the radar compartment when he ran out of oxygen, but he regained consciousness moments later when Anderson dropped the plane to a lower altitude. He woke up in time to hear the plane’s engines go silent and realized that they were going down. He braced himself for impact.

As the plane hit the water, it jerked to a sudden stop. The icy waters of the Pacific started pouring into the open hatch of the compartment where Sampson was tucked away. He tried making his way out of the hatch, but the water rushing in had too much force to fight against, so he had to wait until the compartment had filled with water before he could make his way out and then up to the surface.

As Sampson’s head pushed above the surface, he looked toward the front of the plane and saw Anderson crawling out of the cockpit. Together, the two men were able to pull two life rafts out of the plane before it sunk out of sight. Although the water was very choppy, both men were able to make it into their life raft.

They took stock of their situation. Anderson believed that they had gone down no more than two miles off the coast of Point Reyes, California. There was a thick fog that obstructed their vision so that they couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of the life rafts, and it had gotten dark out, which made it even worse. Fortunately, Anderson had a compass, so he got their bearings, pointed toward the east, and the two men began paddling their rafts toward where they hopped the shore would be.

Before long, the fog got thicker and the waves grew higher. Suddenly, a huge wave capsized the raft that Sampson was in, throwing him into the icy waters. He tried to grab for the raft, but the current quickly carried it out of his reach. When Anderson saw what happened, he tried frantically to paddle his raft to aid Sampson, but the waves easily tossed his raft around and carried him away until Sampson was lost in the fog and darkness.

When Sampson saw Anderson disappear in the fog, he felt a moment of helplessness and despair. But he wasn’t about to give up. He knew that he was a good swimmer and that the shore was somewhere between one and two miles to the east. But which direction was east? He couldn’t see more than a few feet in any direction, and Anderson was the one with the compass. Sampson was also aware that these waters were known breeding grounds for Great White Sharks. Finally, Sampson picked a direction and began to swim, knowing that he could die of hypothermia, be pulled under and drown, or be attacked by sharks before he reached shore – IF he was even headed in the right direction.

After what seemed like at least an hour of swimming, Sampson’s arms ached and his chest hurt from the exertion of swimming through such choppy waters. He had been pulled under several times and had fought to regain the surface, gagging on the saltwater he swallowed in the process.

Then the fog began to lift. Off in the distance, Sampson saw what appeared to be lights. With renewed vigor, he made his way towards the lights. His arms and legs were like rubber, and by the time he felt sand underneath him and crawled out of the ocean onto the shore, he was completely exhausted. He lay there, face down in the sand with the waves washing over him for some time. He was too weak to walk, so he crawled toward the nearest light, vomiting up seawater several times as he got closer.

It had taken Sampson forty-five minutes to crawl from the beech to the source of the light, which turned out to be coming through the window of a building that happened to be a radio station on Point Reyes. With the last of his strength, Sampson crawled up the stairs and banged on the door.

The employee of the radio station opened the door to find the body of a man dressed in a soldier’s uniform, soaking wet and passed out on the stairs. He dragged the man inside to find that he was only half-conscious. He was hypothermic and shivering uncontrollably. The man wasn’t able to talk, but it was obvious to the station employee that he had gone through something terrible and that he needed medical attention. There was a coast guard station only a couple of miles away, so the employee gave them a call and within a few minutes, the coast guard arrived to take Sampson back to their station where medical treatment was available.

At the coast guard station, Sampson was also eventually reunited with Anderson, who had made it to shore in his raft.

A lot of things went wrong on that flight for Sampson; the mistake with the fuel, the radio going out, the oxygen quitting and eventually having to ditch the plane in the Pacific, being capsized, and losing his raft with no directions and in shark-infested waters. But there were a lot of things that went in his favor as well. If the hatch had not been stuck open, he may not have been able to open it by himself once the plane had crashed into the frigid ocean. After all of the directions that he could have chosen to swim toward, he chose the one direction that brought him safely to shore. He could have drowned or been eaten by sharks before he made it to shore, or he could have made it to a deserted section of the beech where he would have died of exposure before being found.

We don’t know if Sampson ever counted his blessings when considering that night. We don’t know if he ever felt some sense of purpose or destiny that wouldn’t allow him to be taken before his work was done. But it’s for certain that he still had much to accomplish.

He completed his military service at Fort Ord, remaining the lifeguard at the base pool until the end of the war. Then, he wound up in Hollywood. Over the next sixty-five years, Sampson would have one of the most successful careers in show business, winning multiple awards as an actor, director, and producer. He contributed, in those capacities, to over fifty films, including over twenty Westerns. His films have won a total of thirteen Academy Awards and eight Golden Globes.

Because he still had work to do; because he wasn’t destined to sink to the bottom of the Pacific back in 1951, we all have been able to enjoy the brilliant talents of Clint “Sampson” Eastwood.

Mike is an award-winning Western author currently living in a 600-square-foot cabin in the mountains of Western Montana. He has been married to his redheaded sweetheart, Tami, since 1989. He is a Western Fictioneers Peacemaker Award Finalist three years in a row and his short stories have been published in numerous anthologies and are available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other online retailers as well as brick and mortar bookstores. His first Western novel, The Sons of Philo Gaines, was released in November of 2020. It was a Peacemaker Award Finalist in two categories and won the Will Rogers Gold Medallion for Western Fiction. It is available everywhere books are sold. Mike is a member of Western Writers of America and Western Fictioneers. You can find him on Facebook at MichaelRRittAuthor, or on his website at MichaelRRitt.com.

Strother Martin - character actor - by Kaye Spencer #westernfictioneers #hollywood #westernmovies

This month I’m remembering Strother Martin (March 26, 1919 - August 1, 1980).

He was an actor who, no matter how small his role, always made me shiver and cringe when he played the villain’s minion or made me laugh out loud at his antics when he portrayed a character in a more lighthearted, comedic role. He had such animation in his facial expressions and his manner. His sniveling laughter and whiny voice were so distinctive.

He was one of those actors that you may not have known his name, but you remembered seeing him in other movies and television shows, and you came to expect certain qualities in his characters.

He is probably best remembered for his role as the prison captain in the 1967 movie Cool Hand Luke starring Paul Newman for saying these words, “What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate.” This line is No. 11 on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Movie Quotes.

It was this role in Cool Hand Luke that opened Hollywood doors for him, and he became one of the busiest and sought after character actors of the time. At the peak of his career, he died of a heart attack.

Martin was born in Indiana, moved to San Antonio for a bit, and served in the U.S. Navy during WWI as a swimming instructor. He aspired to compete in the diving competition in the 1948 Olympics, but finished third in local competition. He was nicknamed T-Bone for his particular diving style.

After his tour of duty, he moved to Los Angeles where he worked as a swimming instructor and swimming extra in films. These small parts gained him bigger parts in character roles throughout the 1950s, particularly in westerns. He had roles in Gunsmoke, Death Valley Days, The Rebel, Stoney Burke, and Have Gun – Will Travel to name a few.

His voice has been described as ‘a distinctive, reedy voice’, and his acting persona as a menacing demeanor, which served him well for gaining roles in western movies such as The Wild Bunch, The Horse Soldiers, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. He had a comedic role in McLintock! and he was also in the original True Grit.

Strother Martin (left) - The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Strother Martin - McLintock!

It was said that his trademark was playing grimy and unlikeable, low-life crazy villains, which was in total contrast to his real life, which was a gardener and classical music aficionado.

Martin also performed in Arthur Kennedy’s Stage Society with Gary Cooper, Tony Curtis, Anthony Quinn, Patricia Neal, Henry Fonda and Richard Dreyfuss. He was known for his Tennessee Williams impersonation. He has an impressive filmography, but so many of his roles were uncredited.

Three days before his death, he said, “No man can achieve immortality. We don’t live for what comes after we are dead, but for what we can achieve in this life – the only chance we have.”

 

Here is a short 1985 skit with Steve Martin and Strother Martin. The video quality isn’t great, but it’s classic goofy Steve Martin and Strother Martin adds to the silliness. It’s called “The Turtle Bronc Rider”.

 Until next time,

Kaye Spencer

Stay in contact with Kaye—

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Resources:

*Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strother_Martin

Image from McLintock!: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strother_Martin#/media/File:Strother_Martin.jpg

*IMBb website: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001510/

*Western Clippings website: http://www.westernclippings.com/heavies/strothermartin_charactersheavies.shtml

CELEBRITY in the OLD WEST -- Meg Mims

CELEBRITY NEWS FLASH! 

Even in the Old West, people craved knowing all about those considered celebrities. Here's one of the "stars" who made the rounds in the California mining camps before "making it big" on the New York stage.

Charlotte "Lotta" Mignon Crabtree was born on November 7, 1847, in New York City. Her English father John Ashworth Crabtree was a bookseller who left his English wife and daughter in 1851 to "see the elephant" in California - in other words, seek his fortune in  the California gold fields. Lotta and her mother, Mary Ann (née Livesey) Crabtree, traveled west in 1853 and joined John in Grass Valley and then Rabbit Creek where they ran a boarding house.

Lola Montez was their neighbor, and she "discovered" that Lotta had talent and enthusiasm for performing. Lola even wanted to take the red-haired vivacious child on tour to Australia, but Mary Ann refused. She was shrewd enough to enroll Lotta in dancing lessons, and soon the little girl became a touring favorite in California and Nevada, dancing, singing, and playing the banjo at mining camps. Workers would shower her with coins and gold nuggets. Mary Ann would sweep the stage in case she'd missed any speck of gold. They soon moved to San Francisco, and Lotta became a favorite there. Her mother kept their earnings in a leather bag until it was too heavy, and then used a a steamer trunk. Mary Ann also bought real estate.

When Lotta was sixteen, she gave a farewell performance in San Francisco. The Crabtrees left California for New York. Lotta acted in Uncle Tom's Cabin, and became very popular in the play Little Nell and the Marchioness, adapted from Dickens' The Old Curiosity Shop. Being petite and youthful, Lotta portrayed children well into her adult life. Famous by the age of 20, she began smoking thin cigars - which became her trademark, despite the habit keeping her out of fashionable social circles.

Lotta began touring as a member of her own theatrical company by 1875, bypassing the local stock company route. She was called "the eternal child" and "the Nation's darling" as well as "the Belle of Broadway during the 1880s. Lotta was also the highest paid actress! She could pull in $5,000 per week, which was astonishing for the era. She even traveled back to California, where she performed as Little Nell, and San Francisco loved her. And her mother Mary Ann still acted as her manager - for bookings, organizing the troupe, supporting charities, and investing. Lotta learned to speak French while abroad, enjoyed painting as a hobby, but never married. She had very little social time.

But all good things must come to an end, and Lotta suffered a bad fall in 1889. Due to her injuries, she had an extensive recovery - and a comeback in 1891 wasn't much of a success. Lotta retired from the stage in 1892 at the age of 45. She and Mary Ann retired to a summer "cottage" her mother had built on the shore of Lake Hopatcong in New Jersey, designed by the architect Frank Furness. "Attol Tryst" - Lotta spelled backwards, of course - had eighteen rooms, gorgeous fireplaces, verandas, a billiard room, a music room and a library. More of a mansion than a cottage!

And of course, Hollywood grabbed onto the Crabtree legend with their 1951 film, Golden Girl, with Mitzi Gaynor playing the title role. Mitzi is certainly young-looking, although the film is quite inaccurate -- they show Lotta beginning her career at 16, when she actually began at age six. Most of the film is set during the Civil War, while the song "Oh Dem Golden Slippers" wasn't written until 1879. While Lotta did wear quite short skirts, she NEVER would have appeared as Mitzi does in the above poster! Good grief! And Lotta did not have a romantic interest, or share the stage with a man. 

Hoo boy. Hollywood. Still, I suppose it might be an entertaining film. Lotta's life sure was!

Sources: Women's History Blog, Wikipedia, IMDB

Mystery author Meg Mims earned a Spur Award from WWA and also a Laramie award for her western historical mystery series, Double Crossing and Double or Nothing. Meg is also one-half of the writing team of D.E. Ireland for St. Martin's Minotaur mystery series featuring Eliza Doolittle & Henry Higgins -- lives in Southeastern Michigan with her husband and a sweet Malti-poo. She loves writing novels, novellas and short stories, both contemporary and historical. 

Follow her on Facebook, Twitter & Pinterest!

AND THE OSCAR GOES TO... -- Meg Mims

Last weekend, the Oscars were awarded to films, directors, actors, writers, musicians, etc., nominated earlier this year. Fashion is huge, but so are the winners and losers. And let's face it -- it's an annual ritual that many love.

Usually, when that envelope is opened, the film or actor has not starred in a "genre" style flick. Dramas, epic blockbusters, war films or biopics have earned the most statuettes for Best Picture. Romance and musicals have fared so-so, depending on the era and Hollywood's mood. Despite the popularity of the other types of films - mystery/crime, fantasy, science fiction, horror, adventure, and especially westerns with American audiences (proof in the pocketbook), the Academy often withholds their votes.

Sorry, but it's true. You'd think, given the number of westerns that Hollywood has churned out since its earliest days, that there'd be a TON of golden statuettes lined up along the trail. Not hardly, pardner. Oh, don't get me wrong. There's been PLENTY of nominations - 129 westerns, in fact. Check out the list.

BUT only three, count 'em, THREE, won a Best Picture Oscar. Can you name them? Yes, the answer is below, but try to guess. I'll give ya the first one -- 1930's Cimarron, a "pre-code western", whatever that means, based on the Edna Ferber novel.

Start guessing! My first try, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and one of my favorite films (okay, it might have played fast and loose with history, but it sure was fun!), didn't fare so well.

It earned plenty of nominations (and as I can attest, it's an HONOR to be nominated!), but only won the Best Original Screenplay (William Goldman, who also wrote The Princess Bride), Best Cinematography, Best Original Score, and Best Song. What film won Best Picture that year? Midnight Cowboy. Hmph. Controversy claimed the big prize.

My second guess, the 1956 film The Searchers, based on the book by Alan LeMay, received ZIP. Nada. Nothing! No nod to John Wayne, director John Ford, not a even a Cinematography nomination! That's criminal!

But it has withstood the test of time and is considered a masterpiece, plus one of the most influential films - inspiring David Lean in making Lawrence of Arabia and probably many other sweeping epics. So there.

How about Little Big Man, with Dustin Hoffman? Based on the book by Thomas Berger, by the way, but only Chief Dan George received a nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Hm. Okay, maybe it was "revisionist" history, but still.

Let's try another guess - one of my favorites, True Grit, based on the Charles Portis novel. Yes, John Wayne won a Best Actor Oscar in 1970 for portraying Rooster Cogburn (he deserved it, even though some people believed it to be a 'sympathy vote'). In fact, after accepting the golden statue, he said, "If I'd known that, I'd have put that patch on 35 years earlier." Ha!

Okay, skip a few decades. How about 1990's Dances With Wolves, based on the Michael Blake book? Kevin Costner, a Hollywood favorite. Come on! It had to win something out of TWELVE nominations. And it did pretty well - seven out of twelve. Best Picture. Best Director for KC. Best Adapted Screenplay for author Blake. Best Cinematography. Best Sound. Best Film Editing. Best Original Score. This was the HIGHLIGHT of the western Oscars! Surely it meant Hollywood was falling back in love with the genre? Er...

Two years later, Clint Eastwood claimed this 1992 film as his last western. Oh boy, talk about predicting the death of the genre. So how did Unforgiven fare? I mean, he's Clint Eastwood! CLINT EASTWOOD, best known for riding a horse, for heaven's sake. The film received NINE Oscar nominations, pretty decent, but claimed not even HALF that number. Hm. It did win four - Best Picture and Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Film Editing. Sigh.

Dare I mention this 2005 western film, which earned eight nominations and won three Oscars, for Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay (from the short story by Annie Proulx), and Best Original Score? Sure spurred controversy, so maybe that's why... Let's see how did the Coen Brothers remake of Charles Portis's True Grit fare six years later in the 2011 Academy Awards.

The film received TEN, count 'em, TEN nominations. Lost every time. Hmph. Does this mean Hollywood has given up on western films? Well, Christoph Waltz received a Best Supporting Actor for Django Unchained in 2012. But when it comes to Best Picture? Three. Cimarron (1956). Dances With Wolves (1990). Unforgiven (1992). Sigh. Only three Best Picture Oscars. We'll see if Quentin Tarantino can pull off any nominations next January for The Hateful Eight.

Let's hope Best Picture #4 for a western is coming soon.

Mystery author Meg Mims lives in Southeastern Michigan with her husband and a 'Make My Day' Malti-poo dog. Meg loves writing novels, short novellas and short stories, both contemporary and historical. Her Spur and Laramie Award winning books - Double Crossing and Double or Nothing - are now among the Prairie Rose Publications book list. Meg is also one-half of the D.E. Ireland team writing the Eliza Doolittle & Henry Higgins Mystery series for St. Martin's Minotaur. Wouldn't It Be Deadly, Book 1, has been nominated for a 2014 AGATHA AWARD for Best Historical Mystery! Book 2, Move Your Blooming Corpse, will be released on September 22, 2015. You can find Meg (and D.E. Ireland) on Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest.