Although the story of what happened next sometimes varies, while Archie was parking the car, Elsie and the five children found a strange object. They yelled to Archie about their discovery, but before he could shout   a warning, the object — a Japanese balloon bomb — detonated. The five youths — Jay Gifford, 13, Edward Engen, 13, Dick Patzke, 14, Joan Patzke, 13 and Sherman Shoemaker, 11 — died immediately. Elsie, 26 years old and five months pregnant, was critically wounded and died shortly afterward.        “I always tear up when I talk about Elsie,” said John Kaiser, the Fremont-Winema National Forest archaeologist, while recounting the 70-years-ago events during the lowkey gathering. “She suffered more than anyone.”

   More recognition needed

   “We want it to be a monument to peace,” Brillenz said of the tall stone monument built at the explosion site that was dedicated in 1950.

   Possible projects include removing the existing cyclone fence and replacing it with a stone wall, making the site ADA accessible, installing interpretive panels, developing campsites, adding log benches and building a trail to Leonard Creek.

   “Most of America doesn’t know this exists,” said Kaiser, who grew up in Corvallis but wasn’t aware of the incident until he moved to Lakeview with the Forest Service.  

   Annie Fagan Patzke, 84, who was the same age as Dick Patzke and best friends with his sister, Joan, said her grandchildren have often written reports about what is known as the Bly Bombing for school reports. She said when her grandson, Drew Patzke, wrote a report “his teacher said it didn’t happen.”

   She said her parents, Elmo and Verna Fagan, had planned to allow her to join the group, but decided against doing so because they needed to stop in Klamath Falls that morning before driving out to Bly.

   Military officials had early censored any information about balloon bombs and, after the Bly incident   , refused to disclose information about the deaths and the cause of the deaths.

   The bombs were attached to large balloons that flew from Japan to the Pacific Northwest by the easterly blowing jet stream.

   She said her family and many other Bly area people visited the site the following morning. The bodies had been removed but a large amount of debris was scattered about the site. “I know there were a lot of people taking shrapnel from the trees.”

   “He didn’t hear about it for a while,” Annie Patzke said of her husband-to-be. “He got a sympathy card from somebody saying, ‘I’m sorry for the death in your family.’”

   “So I just finished up what I was doing at Casey’s and took off. Why? Because it was my family.”

   “What better place,” she said, smiling brightly, “to go to heaven.”

   It was 70 years ago — May 5, 1945 — when a Japanese balloon bomb was accidentally detonated by a group of school children in the woods near Bly. Five children and Elsie Mitchell, the fivemonths pregnant wife of Bly minister Archie Mitchell, died from the explosion.

   Archie Mitchell, his wife, Elsie, and five children from his Sunday school class were on a Saturday morning picnic. When he stopped to park his car near Leonard Creek, the others jumped out and headed to the creek. Within minutes, the six — Elsie Mitchell, 26, Jay Gifford, 13, Edward Engen, 13, Dick Patzke, 14, Joan Patzke, 13, and Sherman Shoemaker, 11 — were dead from the explosion.

   The site has since been dedicated as the Mitchell Monument. When dedicated Aug. 20, 1950 — it has a stone memorial with a bronze plaque listing the victims’ names — the site was owned by the Weyerhaeuser Timber Co. In 1998, it was donated to the Bly Ranger District of the Fremont-Winema National Forest. The killings were caused by a Japanese balloon bomb. About 9,000 hydrogen-filled balloons carrying 30,000 bombs were launched from Honshu, Japan, during a five-month period that ended in April 1945.

   The Bly bomb was one of more than 300 found in 26 states and Canadian provinces. The Japanese military hoped incendiary and explosive bombs would start forest fires, cause injuries and create a national panic.

   The deaths and ongoing censorship stirred controversy. A day after the blast, Herald and News Managing Editor Malcolm Epley wired the War Department and demanded, “Earnestly   urge lifting restrictions enough to permit warning to thousands of people who go into the woods of this area in spring and summer and are ignorant of the bomb danger.”

   When censorship restrictions were lifted,   the Navy and War departments issued a joint statement describing the nature of balloon bombs and warning people to avoid tampering with strange objects. The statement declared, “the possible saving of even one American life through precautionary measures would   more than offset any military gain occurring to the enemy from the mere knowledge that some of his balloons actually have arrived on this side of the Pacific.”

   During monument dedication ceremonies a year later, Oregon Gov. Douglas McKay said Elsie Mitchell and the five youth were casualties of war, “just as surely as if they had been in uniform.”