Page 20 - Amarillo Senior Link Magazine Fall 2019- Online Magazine
P. 20
Alton Hare The Rabbit from
Throckmorton
By Steve Lott
Even though he was very small, for target practice because it
his dream came true, and he was so remote. It was there that
made the team as left guard. Alton’s fear of water caught up
to him. During training, they
He also had a dream of joining had to execute a water exit out
the Navy. That changed after of a B-17. If the crew panicked,
his well-meaning dad tossed there was a good chance they
him into a shallow stock pond would all drown. Alton was
to make him learn to swim. embarrassed to be a 19-year-old
When he went under, he got who couldn’t swim, so he never
stuck in the mud on the bottom. told anyone on his crew. When
His brother managed to pull everyone got out and climbed
him out, but by that time, he into the raft, they noticed the
was unconscious. After his tail gunner was missing. When
dad tried to resuscitate him, the trainer hollered, “Where
he began to spit up water and is my gunner?” Alton replied,
started to breathe. He survived
hrockmorton, Texas the experience but stayed away “I’m over here hanging onto
is a small town that is from water from that time on. the wing!” His secret was out,
Tsituated in the middle The Navy was no longer in his and he was sent to a man who
of a triangle equidistant from plan. would teach him to swim and
Abilene, Fort Worth, and overcome his fear of water.
Wichita Falls. It mainly consists As a teen, he continued to pick At the beginning of the war,
of dairy farms and blackland cotton but also learned how to there was a shortage of war
cotton. (The Texas Blackland work on the Piper Cub aircraft. materials, equipment and
Prairie runs roughly 300 miles The Cub was a lightweight, aircraft, including the B-12
from the Red River in North simple airplane that has been Flying Fortress. However, by
Texas to San Antonio in the compared to the Ford Model the time Alton got to Kingman,
south, and is named for its T. As a result, when he was the United States war machine
rich, dark soil.) Throckmorton drafted, he told the Army he was building over 1500 planes
was the birthplace of Alton. H was an airplane mechanic. They a month. That led to an
“Rabbit” Hare. When he was sent him to the Air Force. adjustment in his training: Alton
in elementary school, he was would spend every other day
in a race with two other boys. Alton left behind his new bride, in the classroom and alternate
After he beat both, one of them Sena Tatum, who was expecting days flying and learning how to
said the race wasn’t fair because their first child, and went to use his computer-aided guns.
“Hare” had two rabbit legs. The Sheppard Field in Wichita Falls
nickname stuck. in 1944. He got through the The war ended before he could
heat of basic training in Texas be shipped overseas. He was
Alton came from a very poor only to be sent to gunnery sent to Tampa, Florida for the
family who made ends meet school in the Mojave Desert. rest of his duty and then to
because the whole family Kingman Air Force base was Hattiesburg, Mississippi for
picked cotton. As a young boy, built at the beginning of World discharge in 1946. He had spent
he dearly wanted to be on the War II on 4½ acres next to two and half years getting ready
Throckmorton football team. Route 66. It was a great place
20 Amarillo Senior Link
