Hydroplane hero's memorial restored

COEUR d’ALENE — Just in time for Memorial Day weekend, the Lt. Col. Warner Gardner Memorial near The Coeur d’Alene Resort has been restored thanks to the efforts of the Coeur d’Alene Hydromaniacs, a club dedicated to hydroplane boating.

About 40 people gathered Thursday to re-dedicate the lakeside memorial to Gardner, who is considered a hero to many.

“This is not just a statuary,” said Stephen Shepperd, a Coeur d'Alene resident and member of the Hydromaniacs. “It represents a wonderful man who served his country.”

Gardner was a highly decorated Air Force veteran, and during his seven-year career as a hydroplane racer he came to love the community of Coeur d’Alene, where many of his boat races took place.

The hydroplane hero solidified his local popularity in 1963, when he saved fellow hydroplane race driver Mira Slovak after an accident on Lake Coeur d’Alene during the Diamond Cup race.

Jumping from the boat he was driving, the Notre Dame, Gardner dove into the debris field surrounding the crash, holding Slovak’s head above water until a rescue crew arrived.

Shepperd, who worked with Gardner as a teenager, began fundraising efforts earlier this year, raising nearly half of the almost $8,000 bill for the memorial statue's restoration. The balance was donated by the family of the late Dave Heerensperger, owner of the boat Gardner was piloting, the Miss Eagle Electric, when he succumbed to a catastrophic accident in September 1968.

The Miss Eagle Electric was a 6,000-pound boat powered by a World War II fighter plane engine. Hitting speeds over 120 mph, Gardner was poised to win the American Power Boat Association Gold Cup race in Detroit.

“Gardner came out of a turn onto a straightaway, when the boat started to bounce,” Shepperd said, during a March interview with The Press.

In a phenomenon known as “nosing-in,” the front of the boat dug into the water, snapping the boat in half.

“It basically disintegrated under him,” Shepperd said.

Heerensperger’s daughter, Julie, traveled to the Coeur d'Alene dedication ceremony on her father’s behalf. Earlier this week, she rode in a hydroplane for the first time herself, to scatter her father's ashes on Lake Washington’s Seafair Race Course, she said.

Gardner was always modest about his extensive military service, Shepperd said.

“He held it close to his vest,” Shepperd said.

Gardner served in about 63 combat missions during World War II, and received numerous medals. Gardner was decorated with the Distinguished Flying Cross with an Oak Leaf Cluster for extraordinary achievement while participating in an aerial fight in his P-38 fighter in the Mediterranean Theater of action. He also received the Air Medal with 10 Oak Leaf Clusters and the Air Force Commendation Medal.

Shepperd had the pleasure of working with Gardner from age 12 to 18.

“I got to know him, working as a pit worker,” Shepperd said. “He loved kids, he loved people and he endeared himself to the community.”

The Col. Warner Gardner Memorial was first erected in 1969. It now features fresh rock work around its base and a planting of red geraniums. The crew from Terry Cozad Masonry did the rock work with materials provided by Hayden’s Mutual Materials.

The restoration took about three weeks, Cozad said. Three men worked on the job with no problems, other than a few weather delays, he said.

The memorial features a silver F-86 fighter jet suspended above a bronze hydroplane racing boat that sits to the east of The Coeur d’Alene Resort.