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Awards Home  Distinguished Alumni Award   Athletic Hall of Honor

 

Past Honorees »  Distinguished Alumnus  |  Athletic Hall of Honor

 

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2009 Distinguished Alumni Award

 
Norman Hoffman '37

Norman Hoffman ’37 had a notable 60-year career in aviation that grew out of his service in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. After Schreiner, he attended the University of Texas studying civil engineering. He credits his acceptance into the Corps to the training he received during his time at Schreiner. His promotion to the pilot’s “left seat” was also in part due to his Schreiner connection.

“It so happened that my instructor was from Schreiner and he gave me the chance to be a pilot rather than a copilot,” Hoffman said.

  Norman Hoffman


Hoffman was trained as a pilot on the B-26 Maurauder, a somewhat notorious plane known as “The Widowmaker.” His instructor was killed when his takeoff engine failed before Hoffman graduated from flight school as a 1st Lieutenant. Eventually, Hoffman was sent to Preswick, Scotland. He arrived to find that the six-man crew he had trained with had been killed the night before. He got the crew of the pilot who had been killed with them.

He went on to fly 70 missions in the European Theatre, including the first day of the D-Day invasion. “We flew in from France,” he said. “We were flying where the toughest fighting was going on. When we took off, visibility was 0-0. We had to fly 10,000-15,000 feet above the weather and reassemble.”

Col. Bobby Douglass ’67, who nominated Hoffman, said they met at a Schreiner reunion in Dallas and found that they had their military experiences in common.
“My accomplishments were pretty impressive, but his overshadowed mine by about 10 times,” Douglass said. “He is that impressive.”

The Army sent Hoffman to military engineering school, and after he left the military he went on to Texas Tech University. He left in his senior year to go into the aviation business. In 1955, Hoffman and a brother-in-law bought Mooney Aircraft and he developed and ran the company’s national and international marketing program until 1969. He became president of Commodore Jet Sales in 1970, where he was responsible for sales and marketing for the Commodore Jet aircraft. After returning to Texas, he started Interjet Incorporated, a jet brokerage company. The company has celebrated its 34th year, under Hoffman’s leadership.

Hoffman grew up in the Depression and became the man of the family at the age of 6 when his father died. He learned to drive shortly afterwards, and worked as an egg candler, iceman and delivery boy. “In order to be successful, individuals like my father exhibited qualities such as determination, goal setting and a stubborn resistance to being diverted from achieving those objectives,” said Norman Hoffman Jr. ’60. “Schreiner helped in shaping those characteristics.”

“I had a wonderful time at Schreiner,” Hoffman said. “I had a wonderful job; I ran the tailor shop, and learned to press clothes, iron clothes and clean them. I spent the summer working in a local tailor shop so I could go to Schreiner.”

     
     
Dr. Charles Johnson ’58

This is the second time Schreiner has honored alumnus Dr. Charles Johnson ’58; he was named to the Athletic Hall of Honor in 2003. He came to Schreiner Institute on a football scholarship and played on the basketball and golf teams after Schreiner ended its football program in 1957.

Charles Robb ’58, who nominated Johnson as a Distinguished Alumnus, remembers their time at Schreiner: “Charley and I were roommates in old West Barracks. When you got up in the morning you had to run down an open porch to get to the shower, then you had to run back to your room.

“Our football team picked up speed when our starting QB got injured and Charley took over and started passing more.”

  Dr. Charles Johnson

While still at Schreiner, New Mexico State University offered Johnson a basketball scholarship; he ended up quarterbacking the NMSU football team. The team won the Sun Bowl in 1959 and 1960 and Johnson was voted Sun Bowl Most Valuable Player both years. He had a perfect 11-0 season in 1960. Johnson went on to 15 years of success in professional football as a quarterback for the St. Louis Cardinals, Houston Oilers and Denver Broncos. However, unlike many professional athletes, he continued his education, receiving a Master’s and a Doctor of Science degree in chemical engineering from Washington University in St. Louis.

“Charley has proven to be an outstanding Schreiner student,” Robb said. “He has led three professional football teams as QB and obtained a Ph.D. at the same time.”
Johnson had been commissioned a 2nd lieutenant on his graduation from NMSU, and ultimately served two years on active duty with NASA, ending his military service as a captain in the U.S. Army Reserves.

After 30 years working in the private sector, Johnson returned to NMSU in 2000, where he is now a professor in the school’s Department of Chemical Engineering and an assistant to the NMSU president. He has served on the Athletic Council and Hall of Fame Committee at NMSU and on the Memorial Medical Center Foundation’s board of trustees.

“My time at Schreiner taught me great lessons in organization and time planning,” he said. “Those lessons served me well in school, athletics, business and certainly now in education.”
 

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