A C-119 is your chubby neighbor–not much for physique–but able to wrestle that old refrigerator out of the kitchen, not ding the door trim, and make it look easy.  Fairchild’s Flying Boxcar mimics a leviathan Idaho spud tricked out with Pratt & Whitney Wasp Majors (3500 hp each, from 28 cylinders, in 4 rows!) and a duet of not very convincing tail booms.  After a run of 2300 feet, it will lift 12 tons of whatever fits, cruise at 200 mph, and set back down on even less runway.  Always a character actor, it’s closest brush with stardom was in the 2004 remake of “The Flight of the Phoenix,” and then it had crash to establish the premise of the film.

Thirty-one air miles south of Old Rhinebeck, Newburgh’s Stewart Air Force Base had C-119’s in abundance with the the 105^thAero Medical Transport Group receiving them in 1961. This proved convenient, as Cole supplemented his fledgling enterprise by performing at Air Force shows around the country and round trip transport from Stewart could be part of the deal.  Two WWI fighters weren’t going to run to 1 ton, much less 12.  Those thirty-one miles, mostly over the Hudson, to the waiting maw of the Boxcars, were the challenge.  Fortunately, Cole also performed in regional shows requiring ground transport.  To ferry the ships to and fro, he had conspired with a local welding outfit to produce an open trailer capable of carrying a pair of ancient, disassembled war birds.  Leading the trailer for local jaunts, he fancied to use his father’s early 1950’s, less than reliable, Chevy sedan. It was available and sufficed most of the time.

Enough of the preliminaries. Cole obtained a contract for an Air Force show employing the SPAD XIII and Fokker D VII.  Both have single piece upper wings which makes transport relatively easy given Palen on one end and a willing teenage boy on the other.  Sans flying and landing wires, the D VII is a snap to disassemble, assuming enough help to deal with the height of the upper wing.  With a maze of wires and struts, the SPAD is another kettle of clevis pins entirely.  Regardless, Cole had his methods and both machines were loaded. Airplanes and kid in tow, a course was set for Newburgh.

About at the journey’s midpoint progress was interrupted. The Chevy, encumbered with a trailer, along with a backseat and trunk of baggage, tools and spares, proceeded to steam with the temperature gauge finding the extreme of the dial.  Coasting into a handy filling station and popping the bonnet revealed a miniature Old Faithful in a radiator line.  The kid was flummoxed.  Palen opined, “No problem,” purloined a leather shoelace from somewhere, wound it around the offending tubing, and the trek resumed.

In those days, Stewart was an open base.  Oh, there were guardhouses and sentries, but they were used to Palen turning up from time to time and entry was generally a matter of a pleasant wave. Palen observed the custom and rolled onward.  There was suddenly shouting– lots of shouting.  And, soldiers–lots of soldiers.  And, guns–lots of guns–from side arms to rifles.  Cole slammed on the brakes and everyone kept their hands high.

It was August of 1964 and in the Gulf of Tonkin the USS Maddox had exchanged shots with Vietnamese torpedo boats.  A war was heating up and the US military was on alert.