Air Force One

It’s not every day the President of the United States flies into town to see a freshman football game – especially your freshman football game.

OK, so maybe that wasn’t the reason President Barack Obama was visiting St. Louis on Oct 4, 2011. Something about a $25,000 per person fundraiser at one of the stately mansions on Lindell Blvd.

But at approximately 5:25 p.m., the sound of a jet flying over Normandy High School was first a distraction until everyone realized that it wasn’t just any jet landing at nearby Lambert International Airport. It was Air Force One, delivering the President into St. Louis for two evening appearances.

The school, at Lucas & Hunt and St. Charles Rock Road in North St. Louis County, is located directly below one of the airport’s landing paths. For a moment, the plane, (above) photographed against a beautiful blue October sky by Nancy Winkelmann, was so low you could see its windows and that the landing gear was deployed.

The crowd – if you could call about a hundred people in the bleachers a crowd – was buzzing. That’s certainly not something you see every day.

The buzz continued after the game, a 35-26 win over a tough Normandy team that, despite having about half the roster of the Jr. Billikens, wouldn’t give up.

“Did you see Air Force One?” was the first excited question I asked My 15, Jack McCarthy, as we were pulling out of the parking lot.

“I saw it,” he said. “I was on the field then.”

“The President of the United States could have been looking out the window at your game!” I said. “Maybe he was wondering who those kids were playing football!”

Exactly the kind of inane maternal reasoning that makes a 14-year-old boy roll his eyes and reinforces why there’s no way on God’s Green Earth his mom will ever be his Facebook friend.

“I think he probably had other things on his mind,” Jack said, without a hint of sarcasm.

But when your 14-year-old wizens you up, you have to take notice. I seriously doubt Obama is the kind of giddy flier who looks excitedly out the window at every city in which he lands. It was a pretty stupid thing to say. But these things come out of my head straight from the Carol Brady Handbook and I have to blurt them out. I mean, any conversation with your son is a good conversation, right?

“Still, it was pretty cool,” I said. “Probably the coolest thing to happen this afternoon.”

Another smackdown: “Uh, no,” Jack said. “Didn’t you see any of Andre’s plays?”

He was referring to SLUH running back Andre Colvin (above), a force of one, who ran for three touchdowns in the victory. Colvin ran up, down and all over the field, rushing for well over 100 yards in my estimation — probably closer to 200 if two key 50-plus yard runs aren’t called back because of penalties.

Jack also noted performances from No. 89 Hunter Schmidt, who caught a touchdown pass from quarterback Andrew Hunt; No. 22 Brian Edwards, who rushed a touchdown; and No. 14 Mike Zawalski (right), who had two interceptions in the game and was hustling all over the field.

All more impressive to a freshman football player than a low-flying airplane – even one painted blue and white blazoned with the Presidential Seal.

Which means one thing: Jack has become a true football player, and he’s proud of his teammates.

And not even being in semi-close, kinda-sorta proximity to the President of the United States could change that.

I think Obama would be proud.

Photographs by Nancy Winkelmann. Want to see more SLUH freshman football? Visit nancywinkelmann.zenfolio.com/freshmanpix