This is a tribute cache for my father, Mel Lurker(1936 - 1987). Unfortunately, he passed away long before geocaching was started but, I think he would have enjoyed it. You will end your journey to find this cache in a place that is significant in a couple of ways. 1st - This was a place that my dad and I used to ride our bikes to. We would bring a drink and sit and watch planes take off. This was special to me because this is a time I had my dad to myself. See, I had 2 younger sisters and this was one of the times where it was just me and him because they were too young to tag along. 2nd - This is also the sight of the Aces plane crash in 1977.
My dad was a key player for the Aces when they won their first 2 NCAA championship titles. There is always something special about a first and this is the team that started the huge Aces fan base. The Aces were led by Ed Smallwood, Hugh Ahlering, Harold Cox, Larry Erwin, Mel Lurker (My Dad) and Dale Wise.
Here are some of his Aces basketball accomplishments.
- During his junior year, 1959, the Aces won their 1st NCAA Championship. They manhandled Missouri State 83-67 for the championship.
• The very next year, 1960, they won the NCAA championship title once again. They defeated Chapman 90-69.
• He is 5th on the all-time rebounding list in Aces program history with 844 rebounds and holds the No. 6 average with 10.1 rebounds per game – His top effort came as a sophomore in 1957-58 when he averaged 10.9 caroms per contest.
• He is 33rd all-time in scoring with 1,114 career tallies
• He was inducted in to the Aces' Hall of Fame in 1979
At the sight of the final cache, look down the hill and you will see the Berry Plastics warehouse. It is built on the site where the University of Evansville men's basketball plane crash occurred on December 13, 1977, at 19:22 CST.
The plane carrying the team was a Douglas DC-3 which lost control and crashed just a few minutes after takeoff. The plane was on its way to Nashville International Airport, taking the team to play the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders. The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the crash on the pilot's failure to remove gust locks on the right aileron and the rudder before takeoff, as well as an overloaded baggage compartment. The NTSB report said that the plane might have been able to stay airborne had only one of the problems existed. As it was, the extra baggage shifted the plane's center of gravity to the back end, and the locked rudder and aileron made it impossible to provide the needed lift to overcome the extra weight.
Two weeks after the crash, the only member of the basketball team who was not on the DC-3 was killed after being hit by a drunk driver, leaving all of the members of the 1977 Purple Aces Basketball team dead. A memorial has been constructed at the University of Evansville known as the "Weeping Basketball." On stone slabs are engraved the names of the members killed in both the plane crash as well as the student killed in a car accident. Also engraved is an excerpt from the eulogy delivered by school president William Graves at a memorial service: "Out of the agony of this hour we will rise."
