Walter Bowman, always an early riser, left the kitchen and climbed the stairs. He flicked on the upstairs hall light as he mounted the steps.

"Your buddy in New Jersey tried to talk me into a Lahti, because it was a little cheaper, until he found out who it was for. He said the Solothurns were going fast." Walter said this last with a wry grin. "He only had three left. Of course, he did admit that the original shipment came into the country ten years ago."

"Most people don't have a good place to shoot them, and the ammo's kind of expensive," Henry said defensively. "But I think I can get the dies and load for it."

"Well, you'll have a couple hundred cases to reload if you shoot up the two crates of ammo that're in the basement. I didn't bother to lug them up here."

"You got me two hundred rounds of ammo?" Henry almost shouted. That quantity of ammunition was nothing special for a .22, or even a surplus military rifle, but two hundred 20mm cannon shells was another matter. Each 20mm cartridge was the size of a large banana and weighed about a pound.

"Your favorite distributor virtually insisted on it, once he knew the gun was for you. He said you'd want Tracer H.E.', whatever that is." Walter looked at his watch. "I probably shouldn't have let you know about this until this afternoon. Now you won't have much concentration at school."

"Can we shoot it this weekend?"

"Only if your mother doesn't need the station wagon. I don't think we could fit this monster in the Corvette."

Henry Bowman looked longingly at the crate, realizing that there was not enough time to open it and disassemble his new prize before going to school. He grabbed the near end of it and with some effort slid the 120-pound box into his bedroom and shoved it out of the way against the wall.

Walter Bowman was exactly right. Throughout all his classes that day, Henry's mind was not on his studies. It was on the magnificent example of Swiss craftsmanship that was waiting for him back in his room. "Mom, where's Dad?" Richard Gaines asked his mother as she handed him his orange juice. "I need to get over to Sandy's house."

"He's still asleep, and you mustn't wake him," Linda Gaines admonished her son. "He had to stay up late last night." This was almost true. Harold Gaines was, in actuality, sleeping off a major drunk. "But Sandy and me had plans," he said plaintively.

"Sandy and I," Linda corrected. "I have some errands to run today. I can take you over to your friend's house. Your father can stay in bed. He's tired."

Richard turned away. Tired' was his mother's way of saying 'drunk'. Richard's friend Sandy's house was not far from where Joe Hammond lived, but this fact did not cross the boy's mind.

"Let me have about fifteen minutes to fix my makeup, and I'll be ready to go."

"Aw, Mom, you don't have to put on any makeup for that," Richard said, trying to be funny. Richard's mother gave him a quick smile, then turned and walked towards the washroom. "The hell I don't," she said in a whisper after the door was shut behind her.

"So, where is the intrepid field artillery off to today?" Catherine Bowman asked of her husband and son as she joined them at the breakfast table. Her son took a breath, and immediately sang, "So it's hi, hi, hee, in the field ar-till-er-ee, count off your numbers loud and strong " "One, two!" Walter chimed in.

"And where e'er you go, you will always know that the caissons go roll-ing a-long" Henry finished. "No singing at the table," Catherine chided good-naturedly.

"We're going to shoot the cannon Dad got me," Henry said proudly. "It's really big."

"Not as big as some of the stuff your old man got to play with when he was in the Navy," Walter said. "What's the biggest gun you got to shoot, Dad?"

"Got to touch off some shots out of a five-inch rifle on a destroyer in '42. And I was on board the battleship Missouri when she fired all nine of her sixteen-inch rifles, later that same year. I didn't get to pull the trigger, of course, but that was just as well-the view was better from where I was watching."

"Nine sixteen-inch guns," Henry said, awed at the thought. "What did that sound like?"

"Like the absolute, no fooling, this-time-it's-for-real, honest-to-God end of the world," Walter said with a big smile. "I've never seen anything like it before or since. That whole fifty-thousand-ton ship moved sideways in the water about eight feet when those nine rifles fired."

"How accurate were they?"

"With the fire control system we had then, they could hit something the size of a small house at twenty miles, as I recall. Not bad for a gun platform sloshing around in a choppy sea."

Henry quickly did some mental arithmetic. "A forty-foot group at thirty-five thousand yards-that's almost one minute-of-angle accuracy! The best thirty-caliber thousand-yard target rifles aren't any better than that, at a fiftieth of the distance!"

"Haven't you told me that your big-caliber rifles shoot pretty well with almost any ammo, but the smallbores need careful load development to get really good accuracy?"

The boy chewed his lip. "I guess it really is easier to make a big gun shoot well, if you've got good components," Henry said finally.

"Shall we see how that rule applies to the newest addition to your arsenal?"

Henry was already out of his chair and carrying his breakfast plate over to the sink.

"Enough fooling around," Henry said under his breath. "It's time to touch it off." Henry Bowman took a deep breath as he lay in the grass and aimed through the telescopic sight mounted on the left side of the receiver. He started to squeeze the Solothurn's trigger with both his index and middle fingers, which was how the big gun had been designed to be fired.

The Solothurn cannon, as a piece of military ordnance designed to stop tanks, was a colossal misallocation of resources and was obsolete almost from the day it was first produced. Designed and put into production in 1938 just as tank armor was undergoing a quantum leap upwards in its ability to resist penetration, the big Swiss gun had several major things going against it.

Twenty millimeter was the upper limit for a cartridge weapon which could still be carried by two or three men and operated by one. Yet a conventional cartridge of 20mm was limited to a projectile of several ounces, and therefore had to rely on velocity and not explosive content to achieve its design goals. The high muzzle velocity, and the inherent accuracy of a close-tolerance weapon with a rifled bore, meant that the Solothurn could hit a tank at virtually any range where the shooter could still see the target.

When the bullet struck a tank, however, virtually nothing happened. The 5-ounce projectile could penetrate no more than an inch of armor plate at 500 yards, and no tank made after 1940 was so lightly protected.

In addition to being heavy, unwieldy, and ineffective on modern tank armor, the Solothurn S18-1000 had a final flaw: it was made like a 100-pound Swiss chronometer. The precise fit and finish of its tool-steel parts made it susceptible to jamming under conditions of neglect, and the man-hours and machining required to build a single example of the gun were sufficient to produce literally hundreds of cheap, lightweight, handcarried rocket launchers capable of hitting a tank-sized object at a distance of 100 yards. The 4-pound rocket-propelled projectiles produced little recoil and carried shaped-charge warheads capable of blasting a hole through armor that was over one foot thick. In a modern war against WWII-era or later tanks, the Solothurn S18-1000 was an utterly useless boat anchor. For Henry Bowman, it was a dream come true.

I hope this thing doesn't blow up Henry said to himself as he prepared to fire the massive rifle. Ever since the first documented firearm had been fired in 1326, Henry's unbidden thought had been the instinctive wish of every gunner firing a large, unfamiliar weapon for the first time. When the pressure of Henry's fingers reached approximately thirty pounds, the Solothurn's sear disengaged and the firing pin slammed into the primer.

Henry Bowman had never fired a weapon that behaved anything like the way this one did. The 710-grain powder charge and the 2160-grain bullet were both about ten times as heavy as those in Henry's .375 Magnum Winchester Model 70 Max Collins had given him. As both bullet and burning powder blasted out the 52" barrel, a perforated muzzle brake which was threaded onto the end of the barrel redirected the highvelocity gases to the sides and back, reducing the 100-pound gun's recoil. The tradeoff to this recoil reduction was increased concussion felt by the person firing the weapon.

The sensation felt by the shooter, Henry would discover a few years later, could be closely duplicated by hanging a 2" diameter stick of 80% strength ditching dynamite by a thread from a tree limb, and detonating it while standing ten feet away.

Henry's first thought as the gun lifted in recoil was how on earth could they have expected a soldier to fire this thing without any ear protection? His second thought was to wonder how close the bullet had come to his aiming point.

As the 7 1/2-foot-long gun moved Henry a few inches back under recoil, a white streak lanced out of the muzzle and disappeared into the side of an empty 55-gallon oil drum 140 yards distant. There was a barelyvisible flash, a puff of smoke, and a lot of dirt thrown into the air as the 1/3-pound bullet detonated on contact with the drum and the slug's hardened alloy core slammed into the hillside a few feet beyond.

The Solothurn's recoil prevented Henry from seeing these things as they happened, but Walter was standing directly behind his son, and saw the bullet's impact. A second later, Henry's eyes focused on the target site, and he could see he had made a center hit. The oil drum was misshapen slightly, and Henry could see that a large part of the back of it had been blasted away.

"Sights seem to be about on," Walter commented in a voice that was utterly devoid of emotion. "This thing is great!" Henry exclaimed. "Dad, you've got to try it! Wait-let me finish out the magazine." Henry settled back down behind the optical sight, and in half a minute the ten-round magazine was empty. On the tenth shot, the magazine itself was ejected from the gun. The Swiss designers had thoughtfully included this feature for rapid reloading in the heat of battle.

Walter and Henry both looked at the distant target. It no longer resembled an oil drum. The metal was twisted and torn apart, and the hillside behind it showed the effects of the ten high-velocity explosive projectiles.

Henry was so excited he could hardly stand it. "We need some targets that are farther away," he said quickly. He scanned the area, trying to select a safe place to shoot the gun at a much longer distance, then remembered that his father hadn't yet had a chance to shoot.

"Here, let me get another magazine. "You're going to love this one, Dad," Henry assured his father. Walter obligingly stretched out behind the bipod-mounted weapon, gave a final check to make sure his ear plugs were seated properly, and prepared to try Henry's new gun.

When the magazine was empty, Walter also had a big smile on his face.

"What do you think, Dad?" his son asked.

"I think I'll tell your buddy we're going to need more ammo."

June 13, 1967 Henry Bowman did not notice the strange look in his father's eyes as they slid the hangar door open. He also did not notice that it required just a little more effort than usual to pull the big Stearman out from the T-hangar onto the taxiway. He was too focused on going flying with his father to pay attention to such little details.

Henry buckled himself in and turned around to face his father. "All set?" Walter asked his son. "Let me keep the controls for a while. I've got something I want to do that's a little unusual. Don't get too worried when you see it coming. After that, you take over and I'll take some pictures. When we get low on fuel, bring it on back and land. Oh-one more thing. I bolted the lead back in the tail in case you wanted to do a 'B-Squared' or two." The puzzled look on Henry's face that had appeared with Walter's first comment was replaced with a smile. He loved making the Stearman tumble. Walter Bowman fired up the big radial engine and prepared to taxi.

The recently-finished Gateway Arch loomed ahead as the Bowmans flew over St. Louis at 3000 feet. Walter had his 35mm Contarex strapped around his neck and chest with just enough slack so that he could lift the camera's viewfinder to his eye. The big Pratt & Whitney was howling along at full throttle as Walter raised the camera with his right hand and rolled the Stearman inverted with his left. He pulled back on the stick and put the biplane into a screaming inverted dive.

When the nose of the plane was aimed at the spot on the ground exactly between the legs of the stainless steel monument and the altimeter read 1200 feet, Walter aimed the camera and snapped the shutter. The plane was about seven hundred feet from the ground. The Gateway Arch was 630 feet tall. Walter was using his widest-angle lens, fastest film, and smallest lens aperture setting so as to get the greatest depth-offield for the shot. The image centered in the Contarex's viewfinder was of the top of his instrument panel, the back of Henry's head in the front cockpit hole, and the upside-down legs of the stainless steel structure.

As soon as he felt the shutter release, Walter tensed his abdominal muscles and pushed forward on the stick with all the strength in his left arm. The Stearman flew dead center through the Gateway Arch and leveled at 200 feet above the ground, still inverted, as it passed over the bank of the Mississippi River heading towards Illinois. Halfway across the river, Walter pushed harder on the stick and raised the nose. He let go of the camera, letting it dangle on its short leash. He took the stick in his right hand and eased back on the throttle with his left.

At 2000 feet, passing over the far bank and now flying above Illinois, Walter rolled the Stearman upright and level. Only then did he feel the pain. It was like a hot poker in his right side. He closed his eyes and tried to will the agony away.

When he opened them again, his son had turned around in the front cockpit and was staring at him with a huge grin on his face. Walter lifted both his hands in the air and nodded to Henry to show that he was turning over control of the airplane.

For the next half-hour, Walter took pictures as Henry went through a number of aerobatic maneuvers. The pain in his side worsened, but Walter was too pleased with Henry's proficiency to let his discomfort spoil the pleasure he was getting. When Henry executed a perfect 'B-Squared', Walter managed to snap two frames in the middle of the tumbling maneuver before the Stearman fell into an inverted spin. Walter got off another shot before Henry reversed the controls and put the plane in a stable inverted dive before rolling it upright.

As the airport came into view in the distance and Henry cut the throttle to begin his descent into the traffic pattern, Walter Bowman did something he hadn't done for many years. He unbuckled his harness and levered himself out onto the lower wing. Henry was startled to see Walter appear at the right side of the front cockpit hole, but he leaned over to the right and angled his head, knowing his father would want to yell something in his ear.

"That was something I've always wanted to do. I think we did it fast enough that no one could have gotten proof." Henry nodded in reply. What Walter had done a half hour before had been highly illegal. "Think you can land it with me standing here on the wing?"

Henry snapped his head to the right and stared in disbelief at his father. He knew he had heard him correctly. Walter was laughing in the windblast, and motioned his son to turn his ear towards him again.

"Go ahead," Walter yelled. "Just like all the times before. You got a perfect headwind, and I'm clipped to one of the flying wires. If it doesn't feel right, goose the throttle and make a go-round, and I'll get back in. Just remember that with the lead bolted in the tail, your CG is aft of the limit, even with me up here by you, so watch your aft stick. And don't do any inverted maneuvers on final," he joked.

All of a sudden, Henry smiled and nodded. Mom would have a heart attack if she saw this he thought with an inward chuckle. If I don't crash, Dad will be fine. He watched his airspeed and entered the downwind leg of the traffic pattern on a 45 degree angle at an altimeter reading of 1400 feet. The airport was 405 feet above sea level.

Henry scanned the pattern for other aircraft. There were none. He maintained his descent as he turned onto the downwind leg. With his father standing on the right wing, he found that he had to put in a little more left rudder to hold the Stearman in the proper attitude. Henry turned onto final 3 00 feet above the ground at an airspeed of 60 knots. He cut the throttle back to idle when he saw he could make the runway with no power. He was intent on the landing and did not see this father snapping pictures of him one-handed while holding onto the wing strut with the other. He also did not notice that there was no clip holding his father to any of the flying wires.

At what he judged to be about three feet over the runway, Henry increased backpressure on the stick to halt his descent. He was jockeying with the rudder pedals to keep the nose aimed straight down the centerline of the asphalt.

The big biplane held its three-foot altitude as Henry increased backpressure on the stick. The boy was glancing every couple of seconds at the airspeed indicator, watching it wind down. As the needle swung through an indicated forty-eight knots, the stick was all the way back in Henry's lap and the Stearman settled gently onto the runway, no longer having sufficient speed to keep flying. The main gear and the tailwheel touched the asphalt at almost the same instant. With the ten-knot headwind, the Stearman was only traveling about forty miles per hour on the ground, but Henry knew that he was now at the most critical point of the landing.

With a tricycle gear airplane, which had become the most common type starting in the 'fifties, the steerable third wheel was in the nose, ahead of the airplane's center of gravity. In this inherently stable system, the plane would attempt to return to a straight path if the nose gear were turned to one side and then released.

A 'conventional' gear airplane, like the Stearman, had its third wheel in the rear, behind the center of gravity. This was better for landing on poor terrain, where two large main gear in front could endure forces that would snap off a single, more fragile nosegear. The drawback was that having the third, steerable wheel in the rear created an inherently unstable system. If a tailwheel airplane got angled more than a small amount to one side, the plane would continue swinging around so that its center of gravity ended up in front of the main landing gear.

This was called a groundloop. If it happened at any speed greater than a slow walk, the airplane would tip over and put a wingtip into the ground, causing substantial damage. Taildragger pilots had to quickly, judiciously, and continually use the rudder and brake pedals to keep the plane aimed straight until its groundspeed was down to a crawl. Henry knew if he allowed the nose to swing more than slightly out of line, he could not prevent a groundloop, for the finest pilot in the world could not repeal the laws of physics.

The problem was magnified by the tall landing gear that was installed on the custom Stearman, necessary to provide ground clearance for the oversize prop. Walter, however, had taught his son well, and as the biplane settled onto the runway, Henry held the stick all the way back to plant the tailwheel firmly on the asphalt, and he kept the nose pointed straight with quick, precise jabs on the rudder pedals.

The Stearman coasted down to walking speed, and Henry pushed gently on the right brake and turned off the runway at midfield. Only then did he glance over at his father, who was smiling broadly. Henry tapped the left brake and blipped the throttle, and the Stearman turned onto the taxiway and headed for the hangar at the rate of a man's brisk trot.

"Let's put her to bed and go get something to eat. You hungry?" Walter asked after Henry had pulled the mixture control to full lean and the engine had quit.

"Real hungry, Dad."

"Steak n Shake suit you?" he asked, naming their favorite drive-in.

"Perfect." His father jumped off the wing and walked back to the Stearman's tail to swing it around before pushing the plane back into the hangar. The pain in Walter's side had eased to a dull ache. "Your maneuvers were better than ever today, Son. You really greased in that landing, too." Walter took another bite of his steakburger. His appetite wasn't what it normally was.