Last weekend's celebration of the 100th anniversary of the first U.S. military use of Jefferson County's pine plains was a wonderful success.

The highpoint for many Northern New Yorkers was the air show. You did not even have to travel to Fort Drum to appreciate the airplanes, their pilots and support teams. Beginning on Friday the skies over the city, Fort Drum and neighboring towns were filled with colorful planes splitting the sky with precision flights.

Those who did not venture on base missed a terrific event. The airplanes performed over the airfield in close proximity to the vast crowds of young and old, families with children either in strollers or climbing all over helicopters or humvees. The ear-splitting noise and incredible power of today's jet fighters and the skills of pilots of older, smaller piston-powered planes left thousands of people constantly looking skyward to watch a jet fly straight up into the sky 15,000 feet and then plunge back to earth or watch racing biplanes do corkscrews.

The weekend was a fitting tribute to Fort Drum — a base which began its service as a training ground for infantrymen and which today is the most modern power projection platform in North America.

The skills of pilots, the beauty of flight and the organized traffic flow on and off Wheeler-Sack Airfield reminded Americans worried about the high prices of fuel and two wars that our military makes America proud. The sound of freedom rang over the base last weekend.