A new exhibit on Chuck Yeager, coinciding with the 75th anniversary of his breaking the sound barrier, has opened at West Virginia International Yeager Airport.
A new exhibit on Chuck Yeager coinciding with the 75th anniversary of his breaking the sound barrier has been opened at West Virginia International Yeager Airport.
Officials from the airport participated in the opening Monday, along with staff from Marshall University, where Yeager donated artifacts in 1986.
“Gen. Yeager’s influence on our airport and on the aviation community at large is undeniable,” airport Director and CEO Dominique Ranieri said in a news release.
The exhibit is located in the airport’s observation area.
Lori Thompson, Marshall’s head of special collections, said that among the materials in the display are a framed copy of “Bell XS-1 Makes Supersonic Flight,” from Aviation Week, December 22, 1947; a plaque presented for years of dedicated service from the U.S. Air Force; a sculpture on a wooden base commemorating the 50th anniversary of breaking the sound barrier in 1997; and a plaque presented by the Charleston Gazette-Mail for “West Virginian of the Year.”
David Pittenger, a Marshall professor who also works with the flight school, said the long-term goal is to have a rotation of shows about Yeager that draw from the university’s archives.
Aviation pioneer and West Virginia native Chuck Yeager was honored Friday as “one of the greatest heroes in American history” by friends, family and dignitaries.
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WVPB
Vice President Mike Pence speaking at a memorial service for General Chuck Yeager in Charleston, West Virginia on January 15, 2021.
“Chuck Yeager got into the cockpit of the Glamorous Glennis and became the first human being ever to break the sound barrier,” Vice President Mike Pence said. “At just 24 years of age, Chuck Yeager became an inspiration to an entire generation of American pilots.”
Born in Myra, West Virginia on Feb. 13, 1923, Yeager learned to fly in the U.S. Army Air Corps. After World War II he became a test pilot.
On Oct. 14, 1947, Yeager broke the sound barrier in the Bell X-1 airplane, paving the way for manned space flight. His role was immortalized in the book and the film, “The Right Stuff.”
Dignitaries and public figures including Apollo astronauts Charlie Duke and Frank Borman, along with Barbara Eden and the Oak Ridge Boys, honored Yeager in a series of recorded messages.
On the stage, Yeager’s wife Victoria Yeager pointed to an empty chair and paraphrased something she remembers her husband once said.
“This chair may seem empty, but it’s not,” she said. “It’s full of memories. And don’t any of you ever forget, don’t let your children forget, your grandchildren, your great grandchildren on down the line, know who this man was and all that he has done.”
Yeager was 97 years old when he died at his home in California on Dec. 7, 2020.
Gen. Charles “Chuck” Yeager, a West Virginia native and the first pilot to break the sound barrier, has died at the age of 97.
His wife, Victoria Yeager, made the announcement of his passing via Twitter Monday night, posting: “It is w/ profound sorrow, I must tell you that my life love General Chuck Yeager passed just before 9pm ET. An incredible life well lived, America’s greatest Pilot, & a legacy of strength, adventure, & patriotism will be remembered forever.”
Yeager grew up in Lincoln County, West Virginia, and enlisted in the United States Air Force in 1941. Originally assigned as an airplane mechanic, he said he got sick the first time he flew in a plane.
“After puking all over myself I said, ‘Yeager, you made a big mistake,'” noted the Smithsonian’s Air & Space magazine, quoting the famed test pilot about his first time in the air.
But it wasn’t long before Yeager began proving himself as a skilled pilot.
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AP
FILE – In this 1948 file photo, test pilot Charles E. Yeager, 25, poses for a picture in a jet’s cockpit. Yeager was first to fly faster than the speed of sound. Another Yeager feat, flying a jet under a Charleston, W.Va., bridge in 1948, was not reported by the local media. Yeager died Monday, Dec. 7, 2020, at age 97. (AP Photo/File)
During the war, Yeager flew missions across Europe and was credited with downing German planes along the Western Front. While flying over France in March 1944, he was shot down.
Following the war, he remained in the Air Force and was stationed at Muroc Army Air Field in Southern California, which is now known as Edwards Air Force Base.
It was on Oct. 14, 1947 that he took part in a flight that fully etched him into history. On that day, Yeager manned the cockpit of a Bell X-1 and ascended 43,000 feet above the Mojave Desert and broke the sound barrier. The aircraft reached speeds in excess of 700 miles per hour.
At the time, many had feared that an airplane would break apart if it had reached such speeds.
“After all the anticipation to achieve this moment, it really was a letdown,” he wrote in his 1985 best-selling eponymous memoir. “There should’ve been a bump in the road, something to let you know that you had just punched a nice, clean hole through the sonic barrier.”
Mike Youngren of West Virginia Public Broadcasting interviews Brig. Gen. Chuck Yeager. This interview aired Oct. 19, 2006, on the program "Outlook."
He retired as an Air Force brigadier general in 1975, although in an honorary gesture, he was promoted to the rank of major general in 2005.
Famed “new” journalist and author Tom Wolfe chronicled the test flight crews who worked on the military research project aiming to reach speeds that had never before been recorded.
Part 2 of the interview with Brig. Gen. Chuck Yeager. This interview aired Oct. 19, 2006, on the program "Outlook."
Wolfe’s 1979 book, The Right Stuff, featured Yeager and the other pilots who had taken part in the mission. The story was later adapted into a 1983 film of the same name, in which Sam Shepard portrayed Yeager.
In 1985, President Ronald Reagan awarded Yeager the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor. The same year, the airport in West Virginia’s capital city of Charleston was named after the general.
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FR159466 AP
FILE – In this Sunday, Oct. 14, 2012, file photo, retired Air Force Brig. Gen. Charles Yeager talks to members of the media following a re-enactment flight commemorating his breaking of the sound barrier 65 years earlier, at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. Yeager, the first pilot to break the sound barrier, died Monday, Dec. 7, 2020, at age 97. (AP Photo/Isaac Brekken, File)
News of his death drew quick statements from both of West Virginia’s U.S. senators, Democrat Joe Manchin and Republican Shelley Moore Capito.
“General Chuck Yeager was an American hero. West Virginia’s native son was larger than life and an inspiration for generations of Americans,” Manchin said in a statement issued late Monday night. “He bravely served our nation as a pilot for more than 30 years in the U.S. Air Force during World War II and Vietnam. When he became the first pilot to break the sound barrier he challenged each of us to test the limits of what’s possible.”
Capito took to Twitter to honor Yeager.
“Tonight #WV’s own Chuck Yeager slipped the surly bonds of earth and touched the face of God. What an amazing life. Praying for the Yeager family,” she said, quoting the tweet announcing of the pilot’s death.
West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice also lauded Yeager via Twitter.
“Cathy and I send our heartfelt condolences and prayers to you and your family. Gen. Yeager was an American hero and a true West Virginia legend who broke barriers and changed history forever. West Virginians everywhere share in your grief.”
