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HomeMy WebLinkAbout Leroy J. Schoeneman, Brazos Valley HeroesBy Bill Youngkin Special to The Eagle Leroy J. Schoenemann, originally of Snook and now Bryan, always wanted to fly. World War fl gave him that opportunity, and he did it for the next 28 years. According to Schoenemann, "Growing up on a farm at Mound Prairie outside Snook, I would see the planes fly overhead. I wanted to experience that but realized that it was something I probably would never be able to afford to do. I was born on that farm and I figured I would die on it. "I graduated from Snook High in 1941 and was able to get into a National Youth Administration program about plane repair. It was Tike a CCC camp, where we rebuilt a tight plane. When Pearl Harbor happened, we were sent to Corpus Christi Naval Air Station as civil service employees to work on planes there. In 1942, The Army Air Corps removed its requirement that you had to have iwo years of college to enter the flight program. "I went to San Antonio and took all their tests on November 17,1942. I passed and was sworn in that same day. I completed basic training at Sheppard Field in February 1943. When we reported, they didn't have uniforms for us so we began our training in the civilian clothes I brought with me. I almost froze to death before I was issued proper uniforms. "After basic we were sent to Stillwater, Oklahoma, to Oklahoma A&M, where we enrolled in classes like physics, advanced math, etc. to help with the flight cadet program. From there we went back to San Antonio, where we took all kinds of tests. Fortunately, my name was called for pilot training. "We flew all kinds of planes, starting in a PT19, which was an open-cockpit trainer. I eventually flew AP10's at Ellington Field, where on May 23, 1944, at 20 years of age, I was commissioned as a second lieutenant." "I received orders to California, where we were issued mosquito netting, which was a clue certain that we were headed to the South Pacific. We ended up in New Guinea and then on to Henderson Field at Guadalcanal. It was a place I had heard about but never expected to be located. I became part of the 64th Troop Carrier Squadron, but we very seldom flew troops. "The planes were C-47's, and we flew everything to everywhere we were fighting in the Pacific until we got to the Philippines. There things changed. In the Philippines we flew a lot of wounded out to hospitals and dropped a lot of food and ammo to our troops who were cut off by the Japanese. litter patients on a really short airstrip. We had the engines wide open with the brakes on, and if you were really easy on the controls, you could start flying at 60 mph. It was like a carrier take-off. "On one landing we were going to hit the trees at the end because it was so muddy and we were sliding. We unlocked the tail wheel and with one engine reversed, did a 180° turn and slid backwards to the tree line, but we stopped. The soldiers on the ground that brought the wounded to us wanted to bet us we couldn't do that again. It was a bet we didn't take. "In December 1945, on my 22nd birthday, I came home,. landing in San Francisco. I finally managed to catch a plane to San Antonio and was discharged. However, I agreed to stay in the reserves, which I did while attending the University of Houston as a math major. "In February 1951 I was recalled for the Korean War. Even though I was a veteran pilot they wanted me more, I guess because of my math degree, to serve at an `Early Warning Radar Site.' I spent the Korean War at such a site outside of Ben Gazi, Libya. "When I came back, I was placed back on flight status as an aircraft commander of a B-47, a six- engine bomber which was a totally different deal from the C-47 I flew during the war. The C-47 final approach speed was 140 mph, while the B-47 speed was 450 mph. "I stayed in the Air Force as part of the Strategic Air Command, finishing my career flying B-52's. I feel I probably did more for my country during the Cold War flying guard duty in a B-52 over America than I did in World War II. I retired in 1970 after more than 7,000 hours of flight time and came home to Bryan." After retirement, Schoenemann volunteered at Twin City Mission for the next 13 years. Now he just checks on his cows on the farm at Snook. When asked about his service to his country, he responded, "I'm glad I did what I did, but World War II also allowed me to do what I had always wanted to do -fly. Things happened in my life that I would have never dreamed of as a boy on that farm in Snook." Leroy Schoeemann s name is found on the Brazos Valley Veterans Memorial. If you want to have a name added to the Veterans Memorial, for more information, to make a contribution, or if you know a World War 11 veteran whose story needs to be told, contact the BWM at www.veteransmemorial.org or Bill Youngkin at (979) 260-7030. If you want to have a name added to the Veterans "In order to do this, we often had to fly into and Memorial, formore information, to make a contribution, out of dirt landing strips that were mostly mud. It was orifyouknowaWorldWar/l veteran whosestoryneeds so muddy that about the only thing on the plane not to be told, contacttheBWMatwww.veteransmemorial. covered in mud was the nose. One time we had 18 org or Bill Youngkin at (979) 260-7030.