Braniff Flight 352, May 3, 1968

After falling out of the Learning Center 3rd floor window on 12-1-1966, which was a Thursday night, at 8 p.m., I spent a long time in and out of Baptist Hospital in OKC, having one surgery after another. (I joke now about having been OCC's first 'REAL dropout!'). While recuperating from my 5th surgery (radial nerve surgery on my right arm), I took some tests, submitted to an extensive background check, and was hired by Dow Chemical Company in Freeport, Texas. I worked there for a year and a half, until I was healed sufficiently to return to classes at OCC in order to get my degree, a B.S. in Biology.

I missed my friends at OCC, and one week I asked my supervisor for permission to come into work early, on Friday, May 3, 1968, so I could leave an hour early in the afternoon. I was also given permission to miss my lunch, and I picked up another hour, so I could now leave two hours earlier than the usual clock-out time on the day shift. By the time I was able to leave, I was ravenously hungry, so I stopped at a little hamburger place in Freeport. One of our Lake Jackson C. of C. members worked there -- a sweet little 16 year old blond-headed, blue-eyed girl. We talked for awhile and I took too long eating my hamburger and when I noticed the time, I had to drive fast to Hobby Airport in South Houston, for the first leg of my flight to OKC. I was heading to OKC (it was Friday) and I planned on a big date with a beautiful girl at OCC that evening.

I parked my car at Hobby airport and went running with my carry-on to the Braniff ticket counter. I arrived, all out of breath, and, fearing that I had for certain missed my flight to Dallas, I asked the man at the ticket counter if I had missed my flight --- Braniff flight 352 (I was then going to ask if there were other flights I might be able to take, in order to get to OKC that evening). The man looked at me strangely. He then turned to the two women ticket agents standing there with him. They all exchanged looks, and something didn't seem right. All three of them looked curiously pale.

The male ticket agent then looked at me and said: 'Son, you missed your flight. You better be glad you did---Flight 352 has crashed in Dawson, Texas and we fear that all 85 people aboard have been killed.'

I thanked him and walked slowly out of the airport, back to my powder blue, '68 Ford Mustang, got in and drove to OKC. I missed having a date that Friday night, but, late that night, well after midnight, I pulled into OKC. I was so grateful to be 'home', and I felt SO VERY ALIVE. Life was such a precious thing, and I had almost lost my life again. I was still crippled from the fall out of the window at OCC in 1966, and felt so very fragile, and yet, at the same time, so very fortunate. I thanked God often during the 9 hour drive to OKC from Freeport, and I've thanked God so many times since then for his care and keeping.

Years later, around 1986, while relating this story to Ronnie White, (our minister while we were members at Quail Springs Church of Christ), during lunch together at Bennigan's on May Ave., he at first had a surprised look on his face -- then got quiet and then told me that Marsha, his lovely wife, had also missed that same flight! What an amazing coincidence! I had not met Marsha and Ronnie in 1968, and only met Marsha 17 years later at Quail Springs. I have thought about and have wondered about what I feel is God's Providence at work in my life and Marsha's life. Why were we spared? We were no more special than any of the other people who died that day. I didn't understand then. Still don't.

Sometimes His Providence is not so dramatic; sometimes we don't understand or acknowledge His direction in our lives. I have to say, though, that God is so real to me. I am certain of His Providence in my life -- and yours.

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the crash of the Braniff L-188 Electra "II" at 4:37 p.m. on May 3rd, in Dawson, Texas. But for God's Providence and a nice conversation with a little blue-eyed, blond-headed angel from the Lake Jackson Church of Christ, I would not be here today! Thank you, Lord!