"S" is for Southern Aviation School

"S" is for Southern Aviation School. The Southern Aviation School in Camden was founded in November 1940 by Frank Hulse and Ike Jones. They obtained contracts to provide flight training in Greenville and Anderson for students at Clemson and Furman. The program’s success led to the school’s leasing Woodward Airport in Camden and obtaining a contract with the U.S. Army Air Corps to train student pilots. Within ninety days the company built barracks, classrooms, additional hangers, and employed civilian instructors and ground-school instructors. The training of army fliers began in March 1941; between June 1941 and February 1942, the students were members of the Royal Air Force. For the remainder of its operation, Southern Aviation trained American fliers. When the Southern Aviation School closed in August 1944, it had trained more than six thousand pilots.