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0308-W2M-09/2006
Paul G. Schauwecker
U. S. Army Air Forces
WWII US Military
B-24 Navigator, 448th Bombardment Group
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Paul was born September 24, 1923, the son of Clarence and Jessie Gard Schauwecker, in Clay City, Indiana. Graduating from Clay City High School in 1941, Paul entered the U.S. Army Air Forces and was sent to San Antonio for preflight training in August of 1942. His pay was $75 a month. He also completed navigation school in San Marcos, Texas. Paul was commissioned, then sent to Clovis, New Mexico, for assignment as a crewmember on a B-24. In October of 1943 he sailed aboard the RMS Queen Mary to England, where he was assigned to the 448th Bombardment Group at Seething. Paul flew his first combat mission in January of 1944. Later, he participated in the first daylight raid on Berlin, accompanied by P-51 fighter escorts. "They were better than the German fighters and they cleaned out the German fighters pretty fast," he remembers. He calls flak "perhaps the most stressful thing," in air combat. Each mission lasted as long as eight hours. On a typical mission day the men would arise at 2 a.m., eat breakfast, attend briefing, and take off by daybreak. It took him from January to June to complete 30 missions. Most of the time he says he navigated by dead reckoning. He also operated the G-box, an early form of radar. He had three weeks on alert, and then was given a three-day pass. Paul often went to London. Of the English people he says he " liked their resolve and I liked listening to Churchill. At other times he played tennis and cricket and even pitched in to help with farm work. He flew his last combat mission on June 2, 1944, then was assigned to a ferry squadron. He ferried one B-17 back to the United States. He flew another plane into Paris just after the city was liberated. He returned to America in late 1944, reported to another ferry squadron in California, and ferried planes across the Pacific and into Japan when the war ended. Discharged in October of 1945, he entered Indiana University on the GI Bill, graduating in June of 1948 with a degree in business. He later earned a master's degree in business administration. He married Jo Bingman on November 26, 1947. Paul returned to active duty as a first lieutenant, attended meteorology school and served as a meteorologist. He stayed on active duty until 1968. Paul earned a doctorate from Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, then took over the MBA program at Barksdale and taught at Tech.