General Charles E. "Chuck" Yeager enlisted as a private in the Army Air Corps in September 1941 and, after serving briefly as an aircraft mechanic, entered enlisted pilot training in September 1942.
He graduated as an enlisted flight officer from Luke Field in March 1943 and, in November, his unit was sent to England where he entered combat flying a P-51 “Mustang.” When he returned to the United States in 1945, he was assigned as a maintenance officer to the Flight Test Division at Wright Field, where his superb flying skills quickly caught the attention of Col. Albert Boyd, chief of the division, as Yeager flew a plane as if “he was an integral part of it.” In 1946, he graduated from the Flight Performance School at Wright Field and then Boyd selected him as project pilot for one of the most important series of flights in history—flying the rocket-powered Bell X-1 from Muroc Army Air Field. After launch from a B-29 in October 1947, he accelerated to a speed of Mach 1.06 at 42,000 feet and shattered the myth of the once-dreaded "sound barrier" forever. During the late 1940s and ‘50s, Yeager was selected to probe some of the most challenging unknowns of flight in aircraft. Then, in October 1954, he was assigned to command the 417th Fighter Squadron, first in Germany and then in France. He returned to the United States in September 1957 and served as commander of the 1st Fighter Squadron at George Air Force Base. He then graduated from the Air War College in June of 1961 and returned to Edwards where, in July 1962, he was selected to serve as commander of the U.S. Air Force Aerospace Research Pilot School where he was responsible for the training of U.S. military astronaut candidates. After a 34-year military career, he retired on March 1, 1975. At the time of his retirement, he had flown more than 10,000 hours in more than 330 different types and models of aircraft. In the select group of the world’s test pilots, Chuck Yeager became the leader, the role model for his fellow test pilots, a distinguished position that he still enjoys today. The significance of his achievements may be surmised from the fact that he has been the recipient of every major award in the field of flight—from the Collier Trophy to the Harmon International Trophy and the Federation Aeronautique International Gold Medal—as well as the highest honors that his own nation can confer—the Presidential Medal of Freedom and a special peacetime Medal of Honor.
