[2] In late 1938, eleven flight schools were contacted by the United States Army Air Corps by Arnold without any funding or Congressional Authorization.

Arnold asked if they would, at their own expense, set up facilities to house, feed and train Army pilots.

Moving forward, in June 1939, the War Department approved Arnold's request to organize nine civilian flight schools to train Army pilots.

Each CPS was commanded by an Army officer (mostly, but not all West Point graduates), who supervised all aspects of the program as well as insuring that military discipline was maintained.

In response, the Air Corps issued a request for bid (RFB) to all of the 38 Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) approved flying schools in the country outlining the specifications for Army pilot training.

From the schools responding to the RFB, the Air Corps selected eleven new contractors for Army primary flight training.

[2] However, in the strictest sense, these schools were not owned or leased by the USAAF, and for the most part, they were not designated or activated as Army Air Fields.

[1] In addition to the Air Corps demands for civil flying schools to train military pilots, in late 1940, President Franklin Roosevelt accepted a proposal from British Prime Minister Winston Churchill that the United States train Royal Air Force (RAF) pilots at civilian flying schools.

[1] After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and both Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany's declaration of war against the United States in December 1941, plans were made by the Army to increase the training rate to 50,000, then 70,000 and finally 102,000 pilots per year.

Schools furnished instructors, training sites and facilities, aircraft maintenance, quarters, and mess halls.

[1] Due to the wartime pressure to produce pilots rapidly the AAF paid scant attention to their military training.

The atmosphere of the civilian-operated primary schools was not conducive to the development of rigid discipline, and too little time was available for military instruction at all the stages of pilot training.

What instruction there was, over and above the regimen of Army life, was restricted largely to marching, ceremonies, inspections, and military customs and courtesies.

Ten CPSs remained in operation in 1945, which were closed at the end of World War II and the Army Air Forces returned to in-house primary pilot training.

Other trainees for the glider pilot program had already gone through flight training but had been disqualified, not for lack of skill, but for problems beyond their control such as slightly deficient eyesight.

[1] The main operation got under way at Twenty Nine Palms Army Airfield, in the California desert, where thermal conditions were great for soaring flights.

The combat gliders under development could not soar and gain altitude once the pilot released the tow line as a sailplane could.

[6] Once the Glider Pilot Cadet successfully completed their primary training, they moved on to advanced training, taught by AAF instructors at several military glider schools using the CG-4A Waco and British Airspeed Horsas that the pilots would eventually fly into combat during several operations primarily in the European Theater.