Ken Schreiber – Mena’s Frequent Flyer

BY JACLYN ROSE –

Ken Schreiber left his hometown of Griffith, Indiana in 1944 to serve the United States as a member of the United States Army.  “I drove a tank and a huge 10-ton wrecker in Germany during World War II.  I knew I was going to be drafted, so I enlisted, at this time the war had just ended,” explained Schreiber.

After three years of service, Schreiber began rebuilding old cars.  “I would race cars every Saturday night in Chicago at Soldier Field,” said Schreiber with a laugh, “I even won a few times.”

Around 1962, Schreiber and two other guys went together and bought a plane and began flying for the fun of it.  Over 50 years and approximately 30,000 flight hours later, Schreiber has made a very successful career as a flight instructor and a corporate pilot.  He is well known, and well loved by members of the community and especially those on the field of Mena Intermountain Municipal Airport.

“In 1962, I started as a flight instructor and charter service in Indiana.  I also worked in aircraft sales for Cessna Distribution in Chicago.  In 1968, I sold Pabst Brewing their first plane and I went with it.  I worked as their pilot until retiring,” explained Schreiber.

In the early 1980’s, Schreiber flew over Polk County on a trip to Dallas.  “We flew over and I liked the area, I mean what is not to like,” said Schreiber, looking out of the window across the field at Mena Airport and pointing towards the beautiful mountains.  “So when we took our plane to Wichita, Kansas for maintenance, I rented a car and drove down and bought 20 acres in Board Camp.”

Schreiber and his wife, Theresa, moved shortly after to Board Camp.  “We moved down here to retire, but I started flying for Brodix and then eventually started a little flying service and began flight instruction here.  I taught quite a few people to fly here and I try and teach all the safety procedures in the plane and give good instruction.”

Through his decades of flying, Schreiber has had many exciting experiences and flown many interesting people.  He says, he was a pilot because it paid well, but it does not take hearing too many of his stories to know, flying is his passion.  “Tom Cox and I flew the astronauts of Apollo 11, just a couple of weeks after they landed on the moon.  When we landed, Neil Armstrong stayed on the plane and talked to me for a while.  He was a very down to earth man.  I don’t remember exactly how he worded it, but he told me that when you do something like he did, you have to realize there is a Creator God,” said Schreiber.

Schreiber has also lived through many great strides in technology and flying today is very different from flight when he began.  “It’s duck soup now, with GPS it is so much harder to get lost.” Schreiber said with a smile.  “I flew a Cessna Skymaster to Australia before GPS.  It took 56 hours to get from Mena to Brisbane and we made several stops for fuel and rest.  I had to keep good track of time and use what we call, ‘dead reckoning’ to keep track of where we were,” explained Schreiber.

“I have picked up lots of airplanes for shops out here and test flew lots of planes over the years and I have taught a couple of guys how to fly, but I have decided it’s time to retire and I’m just going to do a little flying for fun,” Schreiber explained.

About Author

Jeri Pearson

Jeri is the News Director for Pulse Multi-Media and Editor of The Polk County Pulse. She has 10 years of experience in community focused journalism and has won multiple press association awards.

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