MSGT. James Schenfield
US Air Force. Flight Mechanic
310th Troop Carrier Squadron
Tan Son Nhut AFB Saigon, Vietnam. ’62-‘63
US Air Force. Flight Mechanic
310th Troop Carrier Squadron
Tan Son Nhut AFB Saigon, Vietnam. ’62-‘63
James Lester Schenfield was born April 12, 1939, in a Elyria, Ohio. A little town just outside of Cleveland. He lived there until the age of 7 when the family moved to a farm in Eaton, Ohio. Jim said his dad was a machine operator in a spring factory in town and was a ‘Gentleman Farmer’. “We had one cow and a bunch of chickens.” His dad was the 4th person hired at the company and then retired 40 years later.
Jim attended Midview High School with a graduating class of 75. “I was never into sports at all.”
Only 4 of the kids in his high school went to college. Most kids went to work on the farms. Jim had an uncle who was in the Navy and served on an aircraft carrier. Jim heard all kinds of stories about the Navy. When Jim graduated in 1957 and his parents couldn’t afford to send him to college, he decided he would join the Navy.
He took a Greyhound bus to Cleveland where the recruiting stations were located. When he arrived the Navy recruiter was out to lunch. Jim went next door to ask the Air Force recruiter when the Navy recruiter would be back. “You don’t want to talk to him. Come on in here.” Jim left 30 minutes later with a four year commitment to the Air Force. He left for basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas that October.
Jim remembers in the corner of the barracks there was a box with sample packs of Lucky Strike cigarettes. Jim wasn’t a smoker, so he didn’t think anything of it. However, during training the drill instructor would say, “smokers get a smoke break for 5 minutes. The rest of you keep going.” Everyone quickly became smokers including Jim and was hooked for 25 years before he quit the habit.
Jim wanted to be a mechanic and he was selected for aircraft mechanic school at Shepard AFB in Wichita Falls, Texas. From there he was assigned to Berkley AFB in Mobile, Alabama where he joined an air medical transport squadron. Their duties included flying around the US on C-131’s to pick up patients at smaller military installations and take them to primary military hospital. He was later transferred to Scott AFB in Illinios.
In early 1962 Jim received orders to Tan Son Nhut AFB. Jim had never heard of Tan Son Nhut and neither had anyone else. He went to library to look up where he was being sent and found it was in Vietnam. Jim got on a bus and headed to Pope AFB. Jim had been in the Air Force for 4 years and still hadn’t flown in a plane. At Pope he was assigned to a flight crew of 4 including the pilot, co-pilot, load master and Jim, who was the flight mechanic. The flight mechanic went along with the plane and serviced the plane and filled it with fuel. This squadron used C-123 twin engine cargo transport planes. After several weeks of training Jim finally got to fly when he went on a test flight.
The squadron headed for Vietnam, and it took a month to get there. The first stop was in the state of Washington where they had to wait for a tail wind. The C-123 had enough fuel for an 8 ½ hour trip and their first stop was Hickam AFB in Hawaii which was an 8 hour flight. From Hickam they went to Wake Island, Midway, Guam, the Philippines and finally they landed at Tan Son Nhut located near Saigon. This was Jim’s first time out of the country, and I asked him what he thought when he got off the plane. “It was different.”
The pilots were shown to their tents while the enlisted crew was taken to a big pile of canvas and stacks of 2x4’s and told to build their living quarters. There were six flight crews and they lived 4 in a tent. Eventually Jim said it felt like a big family. One of their primary mission was to supply ammunition and food to Army and Marine outposts in the jungle. If they were headed to a secure base with a runway they would land and unload. If they had a runway but the area was not secure, they would land, taxi to the end of the runway and turnaround. Jim and loadmaster would open the back cargo ramp and push the supplies, which were on pallets and rollers, toward the ramp and then the plane would head down the runway. The momentum would unload the supplies onto the runway as the plane took off.
Some areas were unsecure, and the planes could not land. In those cases, if there was an open area large enough for the pallets, they would drop the cargo out of the back using parachutes. This was difficult because there was no way to control the wind. If the area was unsecure and using parachutes was not an option, the plane would make a low pass and the crew would push the cargo out. Sometimes these passes were just above the treetops. Jim remembers one mission where they had tree branches in the landing gear. “We didn’t do that too many times because we would have to orbit” and come back for several drops. They often took enemy fire and ended up with holes throughout the plane. One of the aircraft from Jim’s squadron is in the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio and is called patches because it had over 300 bullet holes patched during their tour.
Another primary mission was flare-drop missions. They would drop magnesium flares at night to provide light to the troops on the ground during fire fights. The flares came in cans 3 feet long with a parachute and a timer. They would fly at 2,500 feet, set the timer, and push the cannisters out of the plane. In downtown Saigon the merchants were selling the parachutes they collected after the battles.
The US crews often brought a Vietnamese navigator to help locate some of the remote jungle areas. Jim recalled his Squadron losing a plane. The base received a radio transmission from the pilot of “grenade in the cockpit’ just before the pane exploded. They thought the Vietnamese navigator could have set off the grenade. After that, American navigators were brought in.
His squadron also supported “a little known outfit called Air America.” This was the CIA air force. They would fly missions for the CIA and ended up in places like Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. “We would leave Saigon, and somebody would come out with a suitcase and hand it to us and tell us when we landed someone would be there to pick it up. Who knew? Maybe the pilot knew what was going on, but they didn’t tell us.”
After 12 months Jim’s tour was up, and he headed back to the states. While he was in Vietnam, he hadn’t had any real milk. All that was available was filled milk which was powdered milk mixed with water. On the plane back to the states the stewardess came down the aisle with a refreshment cart which had pint cartons of real milk. The GI’s grabbed those up quickly since they hadn’t had any fresh milk in a year.
It was 1963 and Jim returned to Scott AFB and was assigned to the 11th Aeromedical Transport Squadron. In 1965 he applied for a position in the Military Assistance Advisory Group based in Taipei, Taiwan. This group flew classified missions, using C-47 and C-54 aircraft for Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. who was the American Consulate to Taiwan at that time. It was a four year assignment and the entire family moved to Taiwan. The Air Force even shipped his car to Taipei. Jim made 108 trips to Hong Kong to take and pick up American troops for R&R. Jim really enjoyed this assignment.
In 1971 Jim went to South Korea to be an aircraft quality control position in an F-4 fighter squadron. While he was in Korea, he took a test to become a pilot. Unfortunately, the test said he didn’t have the qualities to be a pilot. One day one of the mechanics that worked for Jim asked him to come to a meeting of his aeroclub. He took Jim for a ride in a Cessna 150 and Jim loved it. They agreed if Jim would pay of the plane time the other would teach him to fly. When Jim left Korea he had his private pilots license.
In 1969 Jim returned to Wright Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. He was assigned to the 4950the Test Wing. They were responsible for testing various aircraft systems, most of which was classified.
In 1973 Jim had the opportunity to go to Flight Engineer school. Flight Engineers did everything the pilot did except fly the plane. His duties included weight and balance, fuel, handling the throttles on takeoff and setting the power in flight. Jim was assigned to a C-121 aircraft which was larger, more complicated, had four engines and required two flight engineers.
Jim used his GI bill to get his commercial license, instructor rating and instrument rating while still in the Air Force. He was also teaching flying on the weekends. One weekend a pilot from Jim’s squadron came over and want to rent a plane. There was a rule that were even the most experienced pilots had to fly with someone if they were renting a plane. Jim went up with the pilot and flew with him for a while and didn’t think much about it. A few months later Jim was on a flight as a flight mechanic and the same pilot he went up with was flying this plane. After a while the pilot said to him, “come on up here and get in the seat.” Jim made two or three takeoffs and landings on the C-131 and taxied in and parked.
Jim retired from the Air Force on October 21, 1977. He taught flying for 12 years in Ohio and built an open cockpit biplane. Jim has an entrepreneurial spirt. When he got tired of teaching flying, he started building furniture and eventually he started a business of wholesaling custom made furniture. He sold that business and then opened a clock repair shop. He kept that business going until he moved to North Carolina.
Jim attended Midview High School with a graduating class of 75. “I was never into sports at all.”
Only 4 of the kids in his high school went to college. Most kids went to work on the farms. Jim had an uncle who was in the Navy and served on an aircraft carrier. Jim heard all kinds of stories about the Navy. When Jim graduated in 1957 and his parents couldn’t afford to send him to college, he decided he would join the Navy.
He took a Greyhound bus to Cleveland where the recruiting stations were located. When he arrived the Navy recruiter was out to lunch. Jim went next door to ask the Air Force recruiter when the Navy recruiter would be back. “You don’t want to talk to him. Come on in here.” Jim left 30 minutes later with a four year commitment to the Air Force. He left for basic training at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas that October.
Jim remembers in the corner of the barracks there was a box with sample packs of Lucky Strike cigarettes. Jim wasn’t a smoker, so he didn’t think anything of it. However, during training the drill instructor would say, “smokers get a smoke break for 5 minutes. The rest of you keep going.” Everyone quickly became smokers including Jim and was hooked for 25 years before he quit the habit.
Jim wanted to be a mechanic and he was selected for aircraft mechanic school at Shepard AFB in Wichita Falls, Texas. From there he was assigned to Berkley AFB in Mobile, Alabama where he joined an air medical transport squadron. Their duties included flying around the US on C-131’s to pick up patients at smaller military installations and take them to primary military hospital. He was later transferred to Scott AFB in Illinios.
In early 1962 Jim received orders to Tan Son Nhut AFB. Jim had never heard of Tan Son Nhut and neither had anyone else. He went to library to look up where he was being sent and found it was in Vietnam. Jim got on a bus and headed to Pope AFB. Jim had been in the Air Force for 4 years and still hadn’t flown in a plane. At Pope he was assigned to a flight crew of 4 including the pilot, co-pilot, load master and Jim, who was the flight mechanic. The flight mechanic went along with the plane and serviced the plane and filled it with fuel. This squadron used C-123 twin engine cargo transport planes. After several weeks of training Jim finally got to fly when he went on a test flight.
The squadron headed for Vietnam, and it took a month to get there. The first stop was in the state of Washington where they had to wait for a tail wind. The C-123 had enough fuel for an 8 ½ hour trip and their first stop was Hickam AFB in Hawaii which was an 8 hour flight. From Hickam they went to Wake Island, Midway, Guam, the Philippines and finally they landed at Tan Son Nhut located near Saigon. This was Jim’s first time out of the country, and I asked him what he thought when he got off the plane. “It was different.”
The pilots were shown to their tents while the enlisted crew was taken to a big pile of canvas and stacks of 2x4’s and told to build their living quarters. There were six flight crews and they lived 4 in a tent. Eventually Jim said it felt like a big family. One of their primary mission was to supply ammunition and food to Army and Marine outposts in the jungle. If they were headed to a secure base with a runway they would land and unload. If they had a runway but the area was not secure, they would land, taxi to the end of the runway and turnaround. Jim and loadmaster would open the back cargo ramp and push the supplies, which were on pallets and rollers, toward the ramp and then the plane would head down the runway. The momentum would unload the supplies onto the runway as the plane took off.
Some areas were unsecure, and the planes could not land. In those cases, if there was an open area large enough for the pallets, they would drop the cargo out of the back using parachutes. This was difficult because there was no way to control the wind. If the area was unsecure and using parachutes was not an option, the plane would make a low pass and the crew would push the cargo out. Sometimes these passes were just above the treetops. Jim remembers one mission where they had tree branches in the landing gear. “We didn’t do that too many times because we would have to orbit” and come back for several drops. They often took enemy fire and ended up with holes throughout the plane. One of the aircraft from Jim’s squadron is in the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio and is called patches because it had over 300 bullet holes patched during their tour.
Another primary mission was flare-drop missions. They would drop magnesium flares at night to provide light to the troops on the ground during fire fights. The flares came in cans 3 feet long with a parachute and a timer. They would fly at 2,500 feet, set the timer, and push the cannisters out of the plane. In downtown Saigon the merchants were selling the parachutes they collected after the battles.
The US crews often brought a Vietnamese navigator to help locate some of the remote jungle areas. Jim recalled his Squadron losing a plane. The base received a radio transmission from the pilot of “grenade in the cockpit’ just before the pane exploded. They thought the Vietnamese navigator could have set off the grenade. After that, American navigators were brought in.
His squadron also supported “a little known outfit called Air America.” This was the CIA air force. They would fly missions for the CIA and ended up in places like Thailand, Cambodia and Laos. “We would leave Saigon, and somebody would come out with a suitcase and hand it to us and tell us when we landed someone would be there to pick it up. Who knew? Maybe the pilot knew what was going on, but they didn’t tell us.”
After 12 months Jim’s tour was up, and he headed back to the states. While he was in Vietnam, he hadn’t had any real milk. All that was available was filled milk which was powdered milk mixed with water. On the plane back to the states the stewardess came down the aisle with a refreshment cart which had pint cartons of real milk. The GI’s grabbed those up quickly since they hadn’t had any fresh milk in a year.
It was 1963 and Jim returned to Scott AFB and was assigned to the 11th Aeromedical Transport Squadron. In 1965 he applied for a position in the Military Assistance Advisory Group based in Taipei, Taiwan. This group flew classified missions, using C-47 and C-54 aircraft for Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. who was the American Consulate to Taiwan at that time. It was a four year assignment and the entire family moved to Taiwan. The Air Force even shipped his car to Taipei. Jim made 108 trips to Hong Kong to take and pick up American troops for R&R. Jim really enjoyed this assignment.
In 1971 Jim went to South Korea to be an aircraft quality control position in an F-4 fighter squadron. While he was in Korea, he took a test to become a pilot. Unfortunately, the test said he didn’t have the qualities to be a pilot. One day one of the mechanics that worked for Jim asked him to come to a meeting of his aeroclub. He took Jim for a ride in a Cessna 150 and Jim loved it. They agreed if Jim would pay of the plane time the other would teach him to fly. When Jim left Korea he had his private pilots license.
In 1969 Jim returned to Wright Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. He was assigned to the 4950the Test Wing. They were responsible for testing various aircraft systems, most of which was classified.
In 1973 Jim had the opportunity to go to Flight Engineer school. Flight Engineers did everything the pilot did except fly the plane. His duties included weight and balance, fuel, handling the throttles on takeoff and setting the power in flight. Jim was assigned to a C-121 aircraft which was larger, more complicated, had four engines and required two flight engineers.
Jim used his GI bill to get his commercial license, instructor rating and instrument rating while still in the Air Force. He was also teaching flying on the weekends. One weekend a pilot from Jim’s squadron came over and want to rent a plane. There was a rule that were even the most experienced pilots had to fly with someone if they were renting a plane. Jim went up with the pilot and flew with him for a while and didn’t think much about it. A few months later Jim was on a flight as a flight mechanic and the same pilot he went up with was flying this plane. After a while the pilot said to him, “come on up here and get in the seat.” Jim made two or three takeoffs and landings on the C-131 and taxied in and parked.
Jim retired from the Air Force on October 21, 1977. He taught flying for 12 years in Ohio and built an open cockpit biplane. Jim has an entrepreneurial spirt. When he got tired of teaching flying, he started building furniture and eventually he started a business of wholesaling custom made furniture. He sold that business and then opened a clock repair shop. He kept that business going until he moved to North Carolina.