In the late 70’s I became one of the Labor Department statistics in what
commentators were calling the worst economy since the Great Depression.  Laid
off with twenty-one teachers in Giles County, then, the next year with seven in
Lawrence County, Sally and I decided to answer the call to go to what was the
Laveen Indian Youth Community in Arizona, where we served as houseparents to
some rowdy teenage boys.
     While in Arizona I came across a deal on a Wizard ultralight airplane.  I had no
idea where to go to fly it, so it sat in storage for almost a year, until we bought an
old church bus and returned to Tennessee and our home on Anderson Creek
Road.  Shortly after getting settled again I decided I would see how the Wizard
flew.  I fired up our old John Deere, set the bush hog real low, and mowed my
private airstrip across the fairly level creek bottom land to the front of our little
thirty acre homestead.  A magazine article I had read said that the way to learn to
fly an ultralight was to simply taxi down the strip a few times, trying the controls to
get the feel, then to actually take off, but fly just a few feet off the runway getting
the feel, then touching down again.  The beginning ultralight pilot would follow this
procedure until he was confident enough to go all the way.
     The Wizard was powered by a fifteen horsepower Yamaha go-kart engine,
mounted to the rear of the wing, and swinging a wooden pusher propeller.  It had
little tires and wheels like those used on the front of a go-kart.  Like most
ultralights of the day, it was an aluminum tube structure covered with colorful
cloth, and really looked nice.  There were no complicated instruments or controls;
you controlled flight by shifting your weight in a swing-like seat.   But only fifteen
horses and those little wheels made for considerable difficulty getting any speed
down my unimproved airstrip.
     My only spectators were Sally, with Hiram strapped to her back, and Leia,
holding Sally’s hand.   In the warm Tennessee Summer sun, turning around and
returning to the beginning of the strip after each trial was quickly sapping my
strength.   My confidence came at the wrong time.  I was about three feet off the
ground, had traveled about three quarters the distance down my airstrip when I
discovered the confidence to go all the way.   I pushed myself back in the swing,
squeezed the throttle, and the plane began to soar upward.  Excitement rushed
through my body as I rose into the beautiful Tennessee sky.  Then, about fifty
feet off the ground, reality hit.  There was no way I would clear those trees at the
end of our property.  Rather that discover what it was like to fly into a towering
Oak tree at that height and at about twenty five miles per hour, I decided to ditch
it.  I swung my body right and forward.  The Wizard made a tight spiral back
towards the open field.
     Sally came running when she saw the Wizard hit the ground.  Widowhood with
two small children stood before her.  She still sighs a deep sigh of relief when she
tells how I just stood up and stepped out from the bent remains of the Wizard.
     A few weeks later I traded what was left of the Wizard for a dirt bike.  The
fellow who I traded with had dreams of converting the Wizard to a small crop
sprayer.  I never heard what happened to his dream.

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