09/24/2026
📜 Throwback Thursday: The Flight to Pierce
Meet Allen Stedry, pictured here in 1939 at a picnic on the Niobrara. He was a science teacher and coach at Valentine High School (later serving as principal in Crookston in 1941). Back in August of 1932, Allen found himself in the middle of a dramatic chapter of Nebraska history.
During the height of Prohibition, Allen and his brother noticed a suspicious car lingering near their farm near Pierce, Nebraska. Fearing the men might be after their chickens, the brothers gave chase. The situation quickly turned serious when shots were fired at them.
Sheriff Ed Schwartz and 26-year-old D. Paul Lowery, a coach at Long Pine who happened to be staying with the Stedrys, went to investigate. They soon discovered the abandoned car—complete with 250 gallons of alcohol. But this was no ordinary liquor bust.
While attempting to tow the car, the rope broke. As they stopped, someone hiding along the roadside opened fire with a sh***un. Sheriff Schwartz was wounded in the hand, and Lowery was struck by sh***un pellets in the neck and back. Lowery died within minutes. The investigation eventually led authorities to W.O. Flanery, a well-known Milwaukee bootlegger accused of bringing liquor into Nebraska. A recently fired sh***un was reportedly found at the farm where he was arrested.
And then came the part that brought our own Allen Stedry back into the story.
As Flanery's preliminary hearing approached, authorities reportedly received word that Chicago gangsters might attempt to break him out of the Pierce jail. The hearing was moved quickly, and prosecutors needed Stedry's testimony. There was just one problem: Allen was in Valentine—about 175 miles away.
At about 2:00 p.m., prosecutors reached him by telephone and told him to get to the courthouse immediately. Rather than wait hours for a train or automobile, Stedry hurried to an airfield and boarded a plane piloted by George Lockhart of Ainsworth. Two and a half hours later, at 4:30 p.m., Allen landed in Pierce and walked straight into the courtroom to testify.
His return trip wasn't exactly routine either. The plane was forced to land in O'Neill before continuing to Ainsworth. By then, darkness had fallen, so approximately 30 cars gathered to light the airport runway for the plane's arrival. Stedry finally made it back to Valentine at about 11:00 that night. Talk about going the extra mile for your civic duty! ✈️ The formal trial finally opened in front of a jury of Nebraska farmers in January 1933, making national headlines as one of the state's wildest Prohibition-era shootouts.
Allen Stedry's adventure is just one of the fascinating stories hiding in the pages of our local history. You never know what you'll find when you turn the pages of an old newspaper!
