Francis Gary Powers, one of the best-known American pilots of the Cold War era, was born on 17 August 1929, in Jenkins, Kentucky.
Interested in aviation from an early age, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1950 and enlisted in the United States Air Force (USAF). After completing his pilot training in 1952, Powers flew Republic F-84 Thunderjet fighter aircraft before being recruited by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1956.
As a CIA pilot, Powers flew a number of highly classified reconnaissance missions over Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union in the Lockheed U-2 Dragon Lady. On 1 May 1960, while carrying out a mission codenamed “Grand Slam”, his aircraft was shot down by a Soviet S-75 Dvina (SA-2 Guideline) surface-to-air missile near Sverdlovsk. Powers survived the incident, was captured by the Soviets and sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment. However, after less than two years in captivity, he was exchanged for the Soviet spy Rudolf Abel during the famous prisoner swap on Berlin’s Glienicke Bridge, which would later become known as the “Bridge of Spies”.
Upon returning to the United States, Powers faced criticism over the circumstances of his capture, but he was eventually cleared by official investigations. Later, he worked as a test pilot for Lockheed before becoming a helicopter pilot for radio and television stations in California.
On 1 August 1977, Francis Gary Powers was killed while covering a news story. His Bell 206 JetRanger helicopter crashed in Encino, California and, according to the official investigation, the accident was caused by pilot error. However, his family has long disputed this conclusion.
More about F.G. Powers and the U-2 Incident in one of our previous articles from the Photo of the Week series, Lockheed U-2C (56–6693).
Cover photo: Francis Gary Powers (Library of Congress, LC-DIG-ppmsca-39634).
