Blaine Schultz was born on the 30th January 1922 in Caledonia Township, Trail County, North Dakota, in the same farm house in which his father had been born. While attending North Dakota State College, he took pilot training as part of the Civilian Pilot Training Program. To enroll in the advanced course he had to sign an affidavit that he would enroll in the US Army Air Corps in the event of an emergency. That emergency came up with Pearl Harbour. He was inducted in Nashville, TN as an Aviation Cadet.

Because of his previous flying experience, he was able to volunteer to be trained at a British Flying Training School and upon graduating, he would be awarded both RAF and US pilot wings and would be placed in the Air Transport Command. Blaine was enrolled at No 5BFTS, Clewiston, and became one of the first twelve USAAF cadets on Course 12. (USAAF and RAF cadets trained alongside each other on seven courses, 12 to 18.)



After graduating from Riddle Field and joining Air Transport Command, he initially delivered a C-46 plane to Marrakech, Morocco, and then served 13 months in North Africa flying a variety of planes out of Casablanca and Tripoli. He returned a C-54 to Memphis TN at the end of the war. He accumulated a total of 1700 hours (900 overseas). After discharge in December 1945, he resumed his engineering training in January 1946, graduated in June 1947 and remained in the engineering industry for the whole of his career.



In the 1980s, the No 5 BFTS Course 12 American graduates started having small reunions amongst themselves. The first was in Columbus Ohio in 1984 and Blaine was one of the attendees along with Doyle Alexander, John Gilette, Pete Lazzara, Fred Renshaw, Ralph Rissman, Dick Schmidt, Otis Skubal, Bill Slade and Clif Suhm. Reunions continued until 2002. Blaine also played an active role in the 5BFTS Association and was the US contact until 2004. He was offered and accepted the honour of becoming Vice President of the Association.



Blaine was an active involved citizen, serving on the South Milwaukee Redevelopment Committee, SM Street Beautification Committee, and the Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Committee and more. He was an election proctor for 20+ years. A member of St. John Lutheran Church in Cudahy since 1959, he served there as President of the Congregation, on the Board of Elders, Head of Education Building committee, the evangelism committee, taught Bible study and was a lay liturgist. He also dedicated 49 years of active membership to the South Milwaukee Lions Club where he was awarded the Birch-Strum Fellowship, Presidents Award, named a Knight of Sight, Eye Bank transport driver and was twice awarded the Lions Club’s highest honour, the Melvin Jones Award.