Iven Carl Kincheloe, Jr.

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Iven Kincheloe

Captain Iven (or Ivan)^[1] Carl "Kinch" Kincheloe Jr. (July 2, 1928^[2] – July 26, 1958^[3]) was an American test pilot, recipient of Silver Star, DFC and double ace in the Korean War^[3].

Kincheloe was born in Detroit, Michigan but grew up in Cassopolis, Michigan. He was interested in aircraft from a very young age. He attended Purdue University, where he majored in aeronautical engineering and joined the ROTC. In the summer of 1948, the ROTC cadet was able to meet Chuck Yeager and sit in the cockpit of the Bell X-1. After graduating in 1949, he received his commission in the U.S. Air Force. He spent a year as a test pilot flying the F-86E at Edwards Air Force Base before being promoted first lieutenant and transferred to Korea in September, 1951. During the war, he flew F-80s on 30 missions and F-86s on 101 missions downing five MiG-15s (earning Flying ace and Silver Star) before returning to the states in May, 1952. At this time, he had reached the rank of captain.

After the war, he again became a test pilot, participating in the testing of F-100 Super Sabre, the F-101 Voodoo, the F-102 Delta Dagger, the F-104 Starfighter, the F-105 Thunderchief, and the F-106 Delta Dart. In the mid-1950s, Kincheloe joined the Bell X-2 program and on September 7, 1956^[4], flew at more than 2 000 mph and to a height of 126 200^[4]^[2] or 126 500^[3] feet, the first flight ever above 100 000 feet. For this he was nicknamed "America's No. 1 Spaceman". The X-2 program was halted just three weeks later after a fatal crash resulted in the death of Mel Apt in a flight in which Apt became the first person to exceed Mach 3. Three years later, Kincheloe was selected as one of the first three pilots in the next rocket-powered aircraft program, the X-15, and would have been part of the Man In Space Soonest project. He was killed in the crash of an F-104A at Edwards AFB, and was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.

In September, 1959, Kincheloe AFB in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan was renamed in his honor. A monument also stands a few miles east of his hometown of Cassopolis, Michigan; it is an angular stone slab twelve feet high bearing a silver model of the X-2 pointed skyward. In 1992, he was inducted into the Aerospace Walk of Honor.

The Iven C. Kincheloe Award is named in his honor.

[edit] See also

List of Korean War air aces
Elmer W. Harris, fellow Korean squadron pilot

[edit] Notes

^ Bryan, C. D. B. (1979-09-23). 'The Right Stuff'. The New York Times. Retrieved on 2006-04-02.
Astronaut bio: Robert L. Crippen. NASA, Johnson Space Center (1997). Retrieved on 2006-04-02.
Fulton bio (89). USAF Air University. Retrieved on 2006-04-02.
^ ^a ^b Burns, Curtis A. (1975). Capt. Iven C. Kincheloe, Jr.. National Museum of the United States Air Force. Retrieved on 2006-04-02.
^ ^a ^b ^c Captain Iven C. Kincheloe Jr.. Air Force Link. Retrieved on 2006-04-02.
^ ^a ^b Taylor, Michael J.H., Christopher Chant (other chapters) (1999). “The chronology of flight 1940 to [1999-03-25]”, The world's greatest aircraft (in English). Hertfordshire: Regency House Publishing Ltd., 388. ISBN 1-85605-523-X. “The Bell X-2 research aircraft is flown by Capt. Iven C. Kincheloe to an altitude of 126,200 ft (38,466m).”