Powers, Gary

Powers, Gary (1922–77) spy and aviator, born Francis Gary Powers in Kentucky. Powers enlisted in the air force after graduating from college. Powers received training in resisting brainwashing, survival techniques, and protocol in the event of capture, and he also was trained in the dropping of atomic bombs. He was recruited by the Central Intelligence Agency, which trained him in piloting the U-2, a top-secret high-altitude reconaissance plane used to photograph enemy installations, and he made a number of flights over the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. In May 1960, as President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev met in Paris to attempt to defuse Cold War tensions, a U-2 piloted by Powers was shot down by a surface-to-air missile over Soviet territory. The United States initially denied the plane was on a spy mission, but the wreckage was sufficiently intact for the Soviets to discern the plane's function, and Eisenhower was forced to admit the truth. The summit collapsed amid angry charges from Khrushchev; Powers was tried as a spy, convicted, and sentenced to ten years. He was traded for a Soviet spy in 1962 amid criticism of his conduct while he was in the Soviet Union. In 1963 he went to work for the LockheedAircraft Corporation. He was killed in 1977 when the helicopter he was piloting while working as a traffic reporter for a Los Angeles television station crashed.