Carl Schurenberg

Carl Schurenberg passed away on April 5^th, a little over three months shy of his 98^th birthday. He was a loving (and loved) father, grandfather and great-grandfather; a loyal husband for 55 years, a successful businessman and provider; a Navy veteran; a lover of sports, and an amateur aviation historian who expressed his love of flight by crafting intricate flying models of historic airplanes. He maintained his independence for all but the last few days of his life, living in his own home by himself, mowing his own lawn and driving himself to visit his nearby children and grandchildren.

Carl grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, the son of Ruth (nee Kelly) and Emil Schurenberg, a homemaker and safety foreman for General Electric, respectively. He was a star fullback at South Side High School, where his game-winning touchdown in a crucial game was still discussed at his 50^th high-school reunion. He joined the Navy out of high school and attended college through the Navy’s V-12 aviation cadet program, which aimed to train civilians to fly in the event they were needed as military pilots. Moved around by the Navy, he attended Notre Dame, Indiana State University and eventually graduated from Illinois University with a degree in electrical engineering. As it happened, the end of the war erased the need for new pilots. While he briefly entered active service, he was mustered out without learning to fly.

Out of college, Carl joined General Electric as a salesman in Lynn, Massachusetts, where he met Lorraine Willows of nearby Swampscott. The two were married in 1952 and had four children. Lorrie died in 2007.

Carl turned out to have a gift for sales. He rose through the ranks at GE, earning promotions that took him to Cincinnati, then to Schenectady, New York, and back to the Cincinnati area. He finished his career in 1987 as a top manager in GE’s industrial sales division, in charge of the company’s relationship with machine tool manufacturers. At his retirement party, his colleagues toasted him as “Mr. GE.”

Born the year before Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic, Carl was fascinated by aviation and the romance of the flying aces who dominated pulp fiction and movies during his youth. While he never learned to fly himself, he poured countless hours into researching and building historically accurate flying models of the airplanes that captured his imagination as a boy. Many of those were sold; two found their way into museums.

Carl was a fine athlete, playing softball and basketball well into his forties. But his real passion was golf. He and his partners were regular winners at club tournaments, and he even notched a hole in one in 1985. As a spectator, he was a loyal fan of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, an affinity he never surrendered, much to the amusement of his neighbors in Cincinnati and Schenectady.

As a person, Carl was warm, humorous and gregarious, the embodiment of a “nice guy.” Watching him work a room at a party, you could easily see what made him a successful salesman. Even as his health faded, he was unfailingly cheerful, reporting his status as “not bad for an old guy,” and ending every conversation with an exhortation to “hang in there.”

His children invite family and friends to attend a celebration of Carl’s life at 1:30pm on Friday, April 26 at Firehouse Grill & Brewery in Blue Ash, Ohio. Make donations in his name to The League of WW1 Aviation Historians. 

Carl is survived by four children, six grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. We will deeply miss his humanity, his love of life and family, and his unshakeable good cheer. We are devastated. But we are hanging in there.