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• A Firsthand Witness of Operation Haylift

  • Dave Shaver
  • 6/12/08

  Winter 1949. It was a winter no one in Ely, Nevada had ever witnessed before. There was so much snow that we did not get out of town for weeks. Snow along the main highways was over 8 feet deep. But when "Operation Haylift" (the big operation to fly feed out to stranded herds of cattle and sheep) began we youngsters (I was 16 at the time)were witnesses of it all, marvelling at the Flying Boxcars passing overhead on their journeys of mercy. Many young men in the town and from the rances volunteered to go on the flights to direct the pilots to the drop zones. In the winter of 1950 the filming company came to town and the main members of the cast appeared at an assembly at White Pine County High School. Some of the students and many of the local people were used as extras during the shooting. When the film premiered in the local theater all the showings were packed out. I remember watching it and recognizing places and people I knew appearing in various shots. We all thought it was a great film. But there was one problem. During the shooting time there was not near the snow on the ground there was the year before. This kind of reduced the effect, but it was still a lot of fun to watch. Years later, in the 80s, I stayed up until 1 am in Pasadena, California to watch "Operation Haylift" on a local channel. I almost enjoyed it as much as the first time I saw it.

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