The hangar doors opened. The crowd rose to its feet.
Patriotic trumpets playing on the sound system faded and the AC/DC pounded.
The big blue tour bus’s air brakes echoed inside the air hangar and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, sprightly and smiling, disembarked.
In a last appeal to Northeast Ohio voters before the presidential primary Tuesday, Kasich and Mitt Romney rolled into the MAPS Air Museum in Green to talk for about an hour and then take a few questions before bounding off to Columbus to spend election-day eve with family and friends.
Unlike the contentious protests at Donald Trump rallies, only one man was ejected while peacefully holding a sign above his head asking Romney to pay the $14,000 his campaign owes North Canton police for event security in 2012.
Standing 40 feet below the aircraft hangar’s silently twirling fans, Kasich — who has made a point of distinguishing himself from Trump’s crude behavior — delivered a humble message of self-reliance and limited government, drawing from personal accounts, campaign encounters and harrowing — even gruesome — historical images to sketch an America that unites in times of trouble and doesn’t wait for government to solve its problems.
As he has in the past, the man from McKees Rocks, Pa., spoke of the tiny, baseball-loving town where his father raised a family by lugging a mailbag for 29 years. His grandfather died of black lung after years of exploitation in the coal mines, Kasich, 63, said, softening the courteous crowd of 550 who sat in folding chairs and another 200 or so who stood behind them.
Surrounded by a century of flying machines, Kasich spoke of American adversity throughout the ages: the Great Depression, men chopped in half by machine-gun fire on the beaches of Normandy, people leaping out of the World Trade Center towers — “somehow hoping they would survive.”
“The spirit of the country rests in us,” he said, stirring emotion.
Coming home
The Kasich campaign has been markedly all-in, first dedicated to New Hampshire, then Michigan.
This past week, Kasich hasn’t left Ohio, which he desperately needs to sustain his winless campaign.
After 23 states have voted, Kasich (with 63 delegates) trails Trump, the front-runner, by nearly 400 delegates (1,237 are needed to secure the nomination).
The Republican Party also needs Kasich to win, as well as Sen. Marco Rubio, whose home state, Florida, also votes Tuesday.
Each victory would deprive Trump of delegates and, theoretically, could trigger a brokered convention. Kasich, surging in the polls this past week, is now tied or ahead of Trump in Ohio. He seems the likelier candidate to beat the billionaire in Tuesday’s crucial winner-take-all primaries.
Next stop: trouble
Even with a bump in the polls, Kasich — who has said he would drop out if he loses Ohio — will need more than his home state to become a viable contender.
And a dark cloud looms over his chances in Pennsylvania, where his campaign heads next after Ohio.
A judge in the state’s capital is hearing testimony this week on whether Kasich’s name should appear on the ballot in Pennsylvania. His campaign submitted 2,184 timely signatures, 184 more than presidential candidates need to run in the state’s primary on April 26. But a complaint was filed challenging 192 signatures.
Kasich is now arguing that the challenge was filed 13 minutes after the 5 p.m. deadline and should be thrown out. The case is likely to be ruled on by a three-judge panel.
Kasich, even when challenged by a local school board member who criticized charter schools, continued Monday to take a civil tone during his town halls, contrasting himself from the rowdy Republican field.
Margaret Durkin attended the speech with her 103-year-old mother. “She says Kasich is the guy,” said Durkin, a retired teacher. “She watches the debates and says they act like kids fighting back and forth.”
Kasich’s fans aren’t deterred by his meager delegates.
“We know he has the fewest delegates,” said Gary Corbett, a retired production manager from Green. “So how do we get him there? We can only do our part and vote for him.”
“He’s the best of a bad lot,” Mike Hill, a North Canton retiree, said.
The crowd also appreciated Kasich’s pragmatism.
“When people run for office, don’t promise them things you cannot deliver because it only angers them and makes them more cynical,” Kasich said to cheers.
“He doesn’t make wild promises,” said Sally Kindsvatter, who attended with her husband and granddaughter, a senior at Jackson High School.
Moderation, please
Kindsvatter and other Kasich fans are fed up with hardliners who treat “moderate” like a four-letter word.
“I’m a very moderate Republican and the party has lost me. I haven’t voted Republican in the past two elections,” she said. “If there’s anybody who can reunite the party it’s John Kasich.”
Doug Livingston can be reached at 330-996-3792 or dlivingston@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow on Twitter: @ABJDoug.