A LIttle Off the Top: The hottest ticket in town
I'm sure there are a lot of disappointed Rolling Stones fans around Western Montana after tickets sold out in a matter of hours earlier this week. Fortunately, I'm not one of them
No, I didn't buy tickets. I saw the Stones during their Steel Wheels tour in 1989, at RFK stadium, so I can go to my death bed saying I saw them.
That was back in the day when I had really nice hair, and the Stones were a really young, energetic band in their mid to late '70s.
Naturally, in the free market we live in, it was only a matter of minutes before some enterprising people decided to take their $150 Stones tickets and sell them on eBay for 10 times more.
Say what you will about scalpers, but they aren't stupid — the average Stones fan these days is more likely to be concerned with financial planning and funding his retirement than scrounging up gas money to make it to the show, so I'm sure there's plenty of people willing to pay $1,000 or more for a good seat to the show.
The Rolling Stones concert raises many important questions though. How many rich folks are there in Western Montana who would pay $2,000 or more to see the Stones? What lucky fan will catch Keith Richards' walker when he throws it into the crowd after the show? Will members of the audience be prohibited from holding up lit cigarette lighters after the encore because of the amount of bottled oxygen in use by the band?
These are probing questions that journalists like me focus on to get to the bottom of the story.
The fight for Stones tickets reminds me of the one time in my life when I was in possession of a precious commodity that other people were willing to pay almost 40 times the face value for — two tickets to Cal Ripken's last home game in Baltimore.
(Did you, dear reader, think I could make it six months without writing a column about baseball? I was about due, you know.)
It was May of 2001, and I was stuck in some corporate training shindig in Baltimore. Usually, when I'm stuck in some boring situation, I intentionally "zone out" and start thinking about baseball. This technique has gotten me through a lot of mind-numbing situations in life — meetings, weddings of people you don't know very well, parent/teacher conferences — you name it.
So my mind was on baseball that day, and everyone was talking about the possibility of Cal Ripken retiring that year. And so the little wheels in my head started turning, and I realized that they were probably right — and why not take a gamble?
I went down to the Orioles ticket office and asked for two of the best seats to the last home game of the year. For 35 bucks each I got two box seats. Worst-case scenario was that I would see another Orioles game with my dad in September, when the temperature was a little cooler.
But the baseball gods smiled on me that day. Within two weeks of my purchase, Cal announced that that would be his last year. He was going to hang it up after that season.
Within hours of his announcement, tickets for the last few home games sold out, as did every game in September, as people scrambled to get a seat to see a living legend, even if they didn't like baseball.
Within hours, box seats like mine were going for more than $1,400 a pair on eBay. No kidding. I sat at my computer and watched bidders drive up the price like a kid watches his bag get filled on Halloween.
The next day my dad called. "Did you hear? Cal's retiring."
We talked about the remaining tickets he and I had for the rest of the season, and he lamented the fact that the last home games were already sold out.
I wanted to keep the fact that I had tickets to the last home game a secret all season, and surprise my dad a few days before the game, but I couldn't hold it that long.
"Dad, I got two tickets to the last home game of the season. Box seats," I said.
I almost dislocated my shoulder trying to pat myself on the back.
By the time September rolled around, the bidding frenzy got even greater as the magnitude of the event began to hit home. My $35 seats were worth almost two grand on eBay, but there was no way I was going to sell them — I just wanted to enjoy that special occasion with my dad.
But fate would intervene. Sept. 11 was a bright and beautiful sunny day in the Washington, D.C. area, until about 8:45 that morning, when our whole world changed, baseball included.
As thousands of flights all over the country were grounded in the days afterward, baseball teams were not excluded. The aftermath of that terrible day included the fact that the entire remaining schedules of all major league teams — including the Orioles — were changed.
Major League Baseball officials, in their infinite wisdom, decided to pick up the season where it had left off after the flight ban had been lifted, and simply tack on the postponed games to the end of the schedule. As a result, my tickets for what would have been the last home game suddenly became tickets for about the 15th to last home game.
What could I do? In light of the terrorist attacks, not being able to see Cal Ripken's last home game was heartbreaking, but paled in comparison to the overall tragedy our country was experiencing at the time. So I kept a stiff upper lip.
Ironically, while I was experiencing my own frustration at having the moment of a lifetime snatched from within my grasp, baseball helped our country regroup and try to return to normalcy, both with Cal's final games and the incredible World Series between the Yankees and the Diamondbacks.
Dad and I went to the game and had a great time. It was a beautiful night. During the game I looked around and couldn't help but chuckle at the fact that some of the people sitting near me had paid more than a $1,000 for those same seats.
I hope the Stones are worth it.
Among Other Things: Barnstormers planted seed for airport
by Paul Fugleberg
With hangars on both sides of the runway, Polson's airport almost looks like a small village with the 4,200 ft. lighted runway as its Main Street. It took a few years to reach its present point, though.
Flashback to the late 1920s: According to the late Les P. Baldwin, Bill Voss was visiting with famous Montana aviator Bob Johnson at Missoula's Hale Field. Johnson told him, "If you find me a good place to land in Polson, I'll fly up for a little barnstorming."
Nate Hart owned some land across the river from Polson and Voss asked him if he could make a landing strip on part of his property. Hart agreed and then Ernie Claffey, employed by the City of Polson, loaned Voss a "wooden float" that was used to smooth out the city's streets.
The float was made of heavy planks, about eight or nine feet long. Voss pulled the float across the bridge and started floating the landing strip through weeds and dusty, rock-pocked ground.
He pulled the float with a 12-cylinder Packard car. Occasionally he'd stop and let the motor cool and he had to pick rocks — some as big as watermelons — and move them aside. He finished the job about 1:30 a.m. About 7 a.m. Johnson flew in with two men and several cans of aviation gasoline.
Neil Keim sold tickets and many folks took plane rides at a cost of $2 each for a 10-minute ride over the Polson area. Johnson's Travelair took the full length of the field to take off with five or six passengers. It was so dusty, Voss said, that it was hard to see the plane until it was about 100 feet in the air.
Johnson returned for several more barnstorming engagements — some in his Ford Tri-motor "Tin Goose" planes in which he hauled 50-gallon barrels of gas and oil plus tools.
In 1928 Polson voters approved by a four-vote margin authority to spend up to $1,000 in bonds to buy an "aviation field." Apparently added to that amount was money from a group of local business people who put up $25 each to make a down payment on 40 acres of land from Nate Hart. Additional runway space was needed and Voss negotiated with Agency Supt. Charles E. Coe for permission to extend the field to the south.
The airport was dedicated July 4, 1934, when a special air mail flight landed at the Polson airport as part of the dedication. A letter was sent to Pat H. Shay in Miami, Fla. The envelope with a five cent air mail stamp and a one cent stamp bore the signatures of Polson Mayor B. Joe Wilson and Postmaster George T. Farrell.
The late Maynard Nixon showed us an envelope he obtained from a Spokane stamp collector. The envelope was imprinted with a large rubber stamp that advertised the airport, the location of Polson as the "Garden of the Rockies." An Indian chief appeared looking over the rapids of the Flathead River near where Kerr Dam is now located.
Nixon did the art work for a second special envelope. That drawing featured a picture of a single engine, high wing monoplane flying over Kerr Dam. The envelope was issued in honor of National Air Mail Week, May 15-21, 1938, and regular air mail flights were made from Polson during that week.
Many interesting things have happened over the years at the Polson airport, some dramatic, some humorous, some traumatic. They've included the February 1943 emergency landing of a B-17 Boeing Flying Fortress bomber with the snow-covered runway outlined by headlights from cars after citizens were alerted by telephone operator Maude Brassfield.
In 1976 an airplane-chasing cock pheasant gained national attention as a "celebirdie." Clyde Frederickson, then airport operator, thought the bird was attempting to protect its territory, but then it became apparent hat it had developed an affectionate relationship with Frederickson's airplane … causing it to be nicknamed the "Tin Hen." Dennis Jones' story of the situation appeared in Associated Press stories throughout North America. It was even featured on Paul Harvey's ABC network newscast.
Then on Jan. 11, 1984, veteran pilot Harry Lee Shryock was shot and killed after he had volunteered to take the place of a 13-year-old boy being held hostage by a kidnapper/robber. Shryock was shot by the kidnapper as both sat in the cockpit of a plane that had been demanded by the kidnapper.
Countless other stories can be told in connection with the airport, but there isn't room.
Be sure to attend the Fly-in this Saturday, Aug. 19, and appreciate the efforts that have made it a great community facility.
Fixed base operator and airport manager now is Vince Jennison. Airport board members are Leroy Hoversland, chairman, Bruce Agrella, John Stene, Nels Jenssn and Mike Kuefler.