US Air Force Lieutenant General. A World War II veteran, he rose in rank to become the US Air Force Assistant Vice Chief of Staff. Born in Fort Payne, Alabama he graduated from DeKalb County High School there in 1936 and entered the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Shortly afterward, he received an appointment to attend the US Military Academy at West Point, New York and graduated in 1941, and joined the US Army Air Corps. After the US entered World War II in December 1941, he was assigned to the China-Burma-India Theater of Operations the following May 1942 and for the next three and one-half years he served in various air depot assignments, and was involved in planning and executing airborne resupply operations over the Himalayan Mountains to Chinese Nationalist and other Allied forces, commonly known as "The Hump" operation. He became group commander of the Southern India Air Depot, a unit associated with Hindustan Aircraft Limited, one of the largest aircraft materiel support facilities outside the US, and worked with both Indian and British units to assure unified support of Allied operations. In September 1945 he returned to the US and was assigned to the US Army Air Forces Headquarters in Washington DC, where he served in the Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff for Personnel. From February to May 1946 he attended the Army Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas and the following November he went to Harvard University at Cambridge, Massachusetts to attend the Graduate School of Business Administration and earned his Master's Degree in Business Administration in March 1948. He was then assigned as a member of the Munitions Board in Office of the Secretary of Defense, Washington DC, where he worked on various mobilization planning studies and on measures to improve defense-wide procurement and supply practices. In July 1952 he was assigned to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, to serve in Headquarters Air Materiel Command (now Air Force Material Command) as Chief of the Plans and Programs Division. In February 1954 he was assigned to a short tour with the 5th Air Force in Korea where he served as deputy comptroller and later as comptroller, and in November 1954 he returned to the US to serve as comptroller for the Central Air Defense Force now inactivated) at Richards-Gebaur Air Force Base, Missouri (now closed). In August 1957 he entered the Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, graduating in June 1958, and became Deputy Chief of the Plans and Programs Division, Directorate of Budget, Headquarters US Air Force in Washington DC, and in 1960 he became its Deputy Director of Budget. In February 1963 he was named Comptroller for the Air Force Systems Command (now combined with Air Force Material Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio) at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. The following year he returned to Headquarters US Air Force as the Director of Budget in the Comptroller Directorate and in March 1969 he was appointed the Air Force Comptroller with collateral duty as chairman, Board of Directors, Army/Air Force Exchange Service. In October 1973 he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general and became Assistant US Air Force Vice Chief of Staff, and retired in this position in August 1974, with 33 years of continuous military service. Among his military awards and decorations include the Distinguished Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star Medal, the Army Commendation Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, and the National Defense Service Medal. After his military retirement, he became the Associate Deputy Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in 1975 and in 1978 he was awarded the NASA Distinguished Service Medal. He died in San Antonio, Texas at the age of 78.