LAST WEEK'S SHORT STORY WEDNESDAY: PILGRIM FATHER McGEE

 "Pilgrim Father McGee" by Frank Richardson Pierce (from Short Stories. December 10, 1946)

I was out of town and away from my computer last week, so I was unable to post a Thanksgiving story on Wednesday.  Here, belatedly, is one to make up for it:

Alaskan bush pilot No-Shirt McGee has a small plane, the Claim Jumper, and a small airfield.  He wants to be licensed to carry the occasional passenger but everything seems to go wrong during his test flight with the Civil Aeronautics Board man -- an usually high wind forces the pane to fly backwards over anchorage, an extremely dense fog causes him to fly for almost an hour upside-down, and, when he finally lands, he discovers the one of his skis has fallen off the plane.  But land he does, and safely.  But the shaken CAB man refuses to grant him the license he wants.

At least Thanksgiving is rapidly approaching and No-Shirt is looking forward to a turkey dinner; for the past three years, during the war, wherever No-Shirt was during Thanksgiving, turkeys were not there.  This year, however, No-Shirt has been contracted to fly a cargo of frozen turkeys for the residents of a small Alaskan town, Placer Lake.  Come hell or high water, one of those turkey will be his long anticipated Thanksgiving dinner.

But No-Shirt's bad luck is still with him.  a heavy ice fog has reduced visibility so he cannot see the ground below.  Flying low through the fog, he spots a flash of red and blue colors.  It's a flag.  Because every community needs to have something to brag about, Placer Lake brags about having the tallest flag pole in Alaska.  No-Shirt radios the ground and informs them to look for their Thanksgiving turkeys within a twenty foot radius of the flag pole.  He then begins to circle the flagpole, dropping the turkeys out his window -- saving one for himself.  Because the residents of Placer Lake have also missed out on Thanksgiving turkeys for the past few years, they respectfully call No-Shirt their "Pilgrim Father."

The ice fog is still too dense for McGee to land and he may soon run out of fuel.  Clarke Gill, a ham operator, tells No-Shirt that there is now 500 feet of ceiling and visibility at Marcus Lake, about fifty miles north of Placer Lake.  McGee heads there, but Clarke soon calls back to say that the fog has returned and he is unable to land there.  No-Shirt manages to find a small frozen lake on which to land and wait out the fog.  He cuts toggle in the ice and uses sealskin rope to safely tie his plane down and commences to wait.  Then the wolves came and began to chew on the sealskin rope.  No-Shirt had left his rifle and ammunition behind to make room for all the turkeys, so he could not shoot at the wolves.  He tried to frighten them away with his lights and by revving his engine, but wolves gotta do what wolves gotta do.  There was a strong chance sme of the tail surfaces and jimmy up some of the control gear, so No-Shirt had to sever the sealskin restraints and take to the air once again in deep fog.  He manages to get to a familiar canyon and land on river ice, which allows him to taxi upstream to his own air field.

Thanksgiving morning and No-Shirt has just put his turkey in the oven and is looking forward to a solitary meal when he gets a radio call.  It's fellow pilot 

Hank Galloway, who is returning from an emergency medical light and is running out of fuel hand has low visibility due to the fog; he needs an emergency place to land.  Hank's plane has wheels, not skis.  Not-Shirt gets in his bulldozer and clears a small path for Hank's plan, then lights barrels of oil to mark the makeshift runway.  Hank's plane begins to land, skids, and crashes.  Hank is injured and needs medical attention.  Also on the plane was Steve Brenner, the CAB man who had failed No-Shirt on his flight test.  Brenner's arms are in bad shape so he cannot fly Hank to the hospital in Anchorage, and he is afraid to have No-Shirt pilot them.  While all this is going on, No=Shirt's turkey overcooks, catches fire, and becomes little more than charcoal.

We know No-Shirt will get Hank to the hospital, but will he ever have his Thanksgiving turkey?  Especially since the local restaurant has run out of turkey and is now serving only flapjacks, ham and eggs, with a few spuds to be washed down by black coffee...

No-Shirt McGee is the hero of 22 stories published from 1937 to 1947 in Argosy and Short Stories.  The author, Frank Richardson Pierce (1881-1966) was the prolific author of more than1500 short stories, three novels, and four feature films.  Perhaps best known for his western stories, he also published adventure tales, aviation stories, and mysteries, his name appearing on the covers of many pulp magazines, as well as the slicks.  Among his other popular characters were All-Around Austin, Frying Pan, Flapjack Meehan and Tubby Willows, "Rusty" Wade, Bud Tuttle, CCC ( western ranch), Dad Simms, Panhandle Pete, Ensign Fuller, Tip (a dog), Hardrock, Stan Dvorak, and Barney Brachen.  a Frank Richardson Pierce story usually means good entertainment.

The December 10, 1946 issue of Short Stories is available to be at the Internet Archive.