TERROR IN OKLAHOMA CITY : Farm Raid Turns Nichols Brothers Into the Talk of a Michigan Town : Blast: Decker residents recall the pair’s hobby of setting off homemade bombs--with suspect Timothy McVeigh.

Just days ago, when it was still an ordinary spring, the farmers, loggers and factory hands in these parts had plenty on their minds: the cold weather that kept corn stubble littering the untilled fields, the high cost of fertilizer, the faraway O.J. Simpson trial and, of course, the Oklahoma City bombing that killed more people than any terrorist action on this nation’s soil.

Most sighed over the scores of lost lives and opined that the roots of the deadly explosion likely lay overseas.

But that was before the barricades went up on Friday by James Nichols’ farm--before the bomb unit and the police dogs pulled into the yard, before the state police helicopter hovered over his alfalfa field, before Nichols himself was spirited to the Sanilac County Jail, and from there to Detroit and on to Oklahoma City for questioning.

James Nichols and his brother, Terry--both named as material witnesses in the case--and their frequent guest, Timothy McVeigh, the prime suspect, were all familiar presences here. All other topics have vanished, unless you count the inconvenience of police roadblocks and the influx of reporters from around the world.

That the horrifying explosion 900 miles away might have originated in the Thumb--a nickname earned by the region’s position on the mitten-shaped Michigan map--is a notion that is still seeping in. In its wake have come recollections of the threesome’s hobby of experimenting with homemade bombs, to some an indicator of guilt and to others a sign of a government setup. Every move the trio ever made has been dissected by the local populace.

And worries, too, are surfacing about the town’s sudden notoriety and possible violent repercussions, especially with “John Doe No. 2” still on the loose and with members of the paramilitary Michigan Militia clearly upset about accusations that the group was somehow involved.

“It’s a little spooky,” said Emma Bullock, whose farm abuts the Nichols property.

Decker itself is not much more than a post office and a tavern. But “everyone knows where Decker is now,” says local resident Ed Fuller, shrugging as he pumps gas at Scott’s Quik Stop. Indeed, the federal raid on the Nichols farm inspired the first extra edition of the local Sanilac County News in its 23-year history--and brought CNN, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp., all three broadcast networks and a host of newspapers to town.

Behind the yellow Formica counter at the Poverty Nook cafe, owner Naomi Bush recalled James Nichols’ last order of chili on Thursday, the day after the bomb. “He seemed extra jovial,” she said, and left quickly, instead of lingering for hours, as he usually did, to discuss the evils of the federal government and the need to fight for freedom.

On three stools in a row, the Woodward brothers and Jerry Miller remembered James Nichols’ nervous laugh, how his brother, Terry, kept drifting in and out of state, how his child died, how the brothers once were married to sisters.

Larry Sadler sipped his coffee and called the Nichols boys “newcomers,” since they only moved 12 years ago to their white house with the green roof and colonnaded porch.

In farmsteads off dirt roads, out at the search site, in convenience stores and bars, they talk of McVeigh’s paranoia about police, about McVeigh and Terry Nichols serving together as Army buddies, about the times that James Nichols renounced his citizenship and tried to revoke his wedding license.

Carl Broecker, 40, a farmer who lost his left arm more than 20 years ago in a feed grinder, recalled how the accidental suffocation of James Nichols’ little boy “hit him pretty hard.” James Nichols left town after his son’s funeral and returned years later to work his mother’s ranch--the old Biddle place. As a fellow farmer, Broecker said, James Nichols was “good-hearted, easygoing and always willing to lend a hand.”

Others were less charitable.

Dan Stomber, who runs a rooster farm due east of the Nichols ranch, recalled how James Nichols never stopped ranting about government oppression and how President Clinton ought to be dead.

“Jim couldn’t keep his mouth shut about persecution by the government,” Stomber said. “There isn’t a neighbor around who didn’t say they were nuts and off the wall.”

Stomber recalled that James Nichols had such a strange reputation that women at local taverns would stop talking to him when they learned his name. “The whole Thumb had heard of Jim Nichols,” Stomber said.

The Nichols brothers had several contacts with the local courts, in civil cases ranging from loan collections to divorce cases. In a 1992 brief, Terry Nichols had stated: “I, Terry L. Nichols, an inhabitant located in Sanilac County, Michigan, State, but not the corporate body politic of either and a natural human being of the American Republic. . . ,” according to the Sanilac County News.

He also attacked the legal system and lawyers, adding: “If all these bloodsucking parasites disappeared, this whole world would be better off.”

Neighbors said that McVeigh and Terry Nichols were spotted in the Decker area visiting James Nichols as recently as three months ago. About the same time, the Sanilac County Sheriff’s Department received reports of explosions on the Nichols farm. No one thought much of the tip until last week.

After all, the three had been setting off bombs on the farm for two years. They fashioned the devices from fertilizer, peroxide, fuels and plastic bottles. “They loved little bangs. That was cool. They definitely took pride in that,” Stomber said.

“Jim said how much better they were getting at it,” Stomber said. “They were figuring out what makes a bigger bang.”

Their place in the murky world of right-wing political organizations is still unclear. James Nichols encouraged Stomber to join the Michigan Militia Corps, one of the largest paramilitary organizations in the country, even though it was formed only a year ago.

“Jim said that group is where you want to be,” Stomber said. “Anybody that was anti-government was a good group to Jim.”

James Nichols mentioned that he had attended militia meetings, and federal authorities have cited his strong ties to the group. Militia officials, however, say they are not familiar with him and that he had nothing to do with their organization.

“We have taken an oath that swears to protect and preserve the Constitution and to protect the people of this country, certainly not to bomb and destroy,” said Col. Lynn Jon Van Huizin, commander of the central Michigan division.

In Wolverine to the north, where the militia commemorated the first anniversary of its founding on Saturday, leader Norman Olson told the Washington Post that two of the three men in custody “attempted to come to meetings and speak out, but they were silenced.”

The militia is most entrenched in the northern and western reaches of the state, but its visibility has been rising in recent months in the eastern Thumb--even as its membership statewide has been dwindling, according to Beth Hawkins, an investigative reporter for the Detroit-based weekly Metro Times.

Hawkins, who wrote a lengthy piece on the militia, said it grew quickly to about 10,000 members she describes as “a mixed bag of Second Amendment types and (Ross) Perot voters who heard the call about Waco and gun owners’ rights.”

But when they learned about the more extremist agenda of paramilitary leaders, many members quit, she said.

In the Thumb, letters espousing the militia’s philosophy of preparation for a government abandonment of the Constitution have been appearing in the letters-to-the-editor columns. “There’s a lot of that talk around here,” logger Delbert Woodward said.

Members and sympathizers are being very careful.

“I’ve had my phone bugged because I fight for the Constitution,” said Kevin Lamb, who drove 45 minutes from his home in Harbor Beach to watch the search at the Nichols farm Friday night.

“I’ll plead the Fifth” on the question of his militia membership, he said, adding that he doesn’t know James Nichols “but I’ve heard about him.”

Lamb scowled past the barricades. “I think they’re maybe trying to use the bombing to get a person punished for his beliefs,” he said. “I think they’re trying to link apples and oranges together.”