In WW2 they screened fighter pilots. They didn't take the first people in the door... Thanks for making our point
Wrong. You basically showed up and were trained.
Civilian Pilot Training Program (or CPTP) was a flight training program (1938-1944) sponsored by the United States government with the stated purpose of increasing the number of civilian pilots, though having a clear impact on military preparedness.
The CPTP/WTS program was largely phased out in the summer of 1944 but not before
435,165 people, including hundreds of women and African-Americans, had been taught to fly. Notable legends trained under the CPTP include: Astronaut/Senator John Glenn, top Navy ace Alexander Vraciu, Douglas test pilot Robert Rahn, top WWII ace Major Richard Bong, WWII triple ace Bud Anderson, former Senator George McGovern, WASP Dora Dougherty and Tuskegee airman Major Robert W. Deiz. The CPTP admirably achieved its primary mission, best expressed by the title of aviation historian Dominick Pisano's book — “
To fill the skies with pilots.”
Two of the largest CPT/WTS schools were Piedmont Aviation, operated by Tom Davis, and Southern Airways, operated by Frank W. Hulse. Piedmont's school was based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, while Southern had schools in Charlotte, North Carolina, Greenville and Camden, South Carolina, and in Birmingham and Decatur, Alabama. Both companies trained over 60,000 war pilots including young men from Brazil (Piedmont) and a large number of Royal Air Force pilots from England (Southern). By 1947 Davis had turned his school into Piedmont Airlines with scheduled passenger flights between North Carolina and Ohio. In 1949, Hulse had Southern Airways flying commercial service between Jacksonville, Florida and Memphis, Tennessee, and between Atlanta and Charlotte. Both airlines began operations with war surplus Douglas DC-3 aircraft that were modified for commercial service in their former CPT/WTS maintenance hangers.