ROADRUNNERS INTERNATIONALE

                                              

CIA U-2 PILOT CARL OVERSTREET

Born in Bedford County, Virginia on June 30, 1929, I went to schools in Bedford and graduated from Bedford High School in 1946.

After being pursued by a civil engineering curriculum for three years at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (V.P.I, Blacksburg, Va.) I entered the USAF as a cadet in December 1949 (Class of 50 G) at Randolph AFB, Texas. After walking off many demerits and mastering (ha, ha) the T-6 Texan, I was shipped out to Willie Field to fly jet airplanes - T-birds and the F-80 A. Surviving jets (buzzing the Grand Canyon, etc.) I finished up in Arizona and was sent to Vegas. Besides the downtown games, it was a lot of fun shooting machine guns, dropping dummy bombs and rat racing in mock dog fights.

Then it sunk in. There was a war going on in Korea.

Early Spring 1951 finds me at Itazuke, Japan, shooting more machine guns. We were now in F-80 C models which I thought pretty neat, not knowing that MiG pilots called them "Fools".

My parent unit in the FE was the 9th Sq., 49th FBG based at Taegu (K-2) Korea. The 49th transitioned to F-84 E in 1951 and I finished my 100 missions around December. Then I was assigned to the 308th Sq., 31st SFW at Turner AFB, Georgia, flying F-84 G's.

At Turner we were supposedly learning to drop nukes on the evil empire so I got lots of flying time and crossed both oceans in single seat aircraft.

By 1954 I was in the 466 Sql of the 508 SFW at Turner. Along with flying oceans we were also back in the machine gun, bomb and rocket business. In 1954 and 1955 the 508 SFW represented the SAC at the worldwide USAF gunnery meet at Nellis AFB. We had some good pilots and good shooters - Don Maggert, "Lil Willie", Dad McMurray, Gary Powers, Chuck Stratton, Bob Schuler, Cy Wilson and Gerry Johnson, to name a few. Both years ('54 and '55) the 508th came in 2nd place to the whole AF. The winners were always the ATC at Nellis. Funny, eh?!

Out on the ramp one day in Winter 1954 Gerry Johnson, our wing CO, stopped me and asked if I would like to meet some folks down town and see what they had to offer. My thoughts turned to F-86's and the Flying Tigers, so off I went. When I saw a photo of the article, I was 100% puzzled, but it was different, so I said, "Let's go."

After physical exams, fitting for a pressure suit and a ride in the chamber to 80M feet (scary), I arrived at "The Ranch" in January 1956. This was the perfect setting for a cowboy - wide open spaces, very little humanity, secret stuff, weird airplanes and all kinds of people into aviation.

Unlike most new organizational assignments in the Air Force, the CIA assumed their new U-2 pilots were professionals and thus we were treated accordingly. Before my first U-2 flight I had visions of doing some hot pilot tricks, but I soon learned that accomplishing the mission for which the aircraft was designed was asking enough.

By Summer of 1956 Weather Recon. Sqdn. A was fully trained and sitting ready at Wiesbaden Air Base, West Germany. With events moving rather slow from my point of view, I took a short weekend trip to Vaduz, Lichtenstein, accompanied by Max Conn, a techrep for Westinghouse.

When I returned to Wiesbaden I got the first word about my being scheduled for the first operational flight of the U-2 over the Soviet Union. I don't know how this happened, but it points out the incidental and trusting manner in which we used to function some years back. In the next year and a half, until the end of my CIA contract, I think we pissed Nikita a bit, but I believe Ike was grateful. Besides my flights covering the Soviets, I also made photos of the Suez from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean after Nasser had it shut down in 1957.

After termination of my U-2 experience in December 1957 I was eager to fly century series jets. There was talk at that time about an "open skies" policy with Russia, so I foolishly put two and two together and ended up flying TAC Recce at Shaw AFB, South Carolina in RF-101's. I stayed in the AF until 1964, accumulating 1000 hours 101 time. During this time flying was routine, but I did get some of the first pictures of Castro's Cuba in October 1962. It is a very pretty Caribbean island.

During my period of flying for the USAF I picked up 1 Soldier's medal, 2 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 3 Air medals and several unit citations. I left the AF in 1964 as a Captain.

In 1965 I married Elizabeth Ann Schaar. In August 1966 our son, Carl Andrew was born, and in April 1969 another son, Keith Alexander came along. 

I operated a fixed-wing STOL aircraft business from my runway, doing charter and other work. After spending a few years away from flying, I needed to again start flying, so I started a commercial helicopter service. I did most of what you could do with a helicopter except fight wars. Business ranged from the eastern shore of Virginia to the Mississippi.

I now reside in Bedford County, Virginia with my wife, Elizabeth.

U-2 Diamond Formation

This photograph, made in Europe in 1957, shows aircraft of the first U-2 detachment to be deployed for operational use in intelligence gathering. On this particular day four aircraft were flown on shakedown flights, with take-off and landing times that resulted in their being airborne at the same time. The pilots, experienced fighter pilots, took this opportunity to exhibit the U-2 to ground personnel in a fighter show formation - the Diamond.
Lead aircraft, Glendon (Glen) Dunaway; right wing, Jacob (Jake) Kratt; left wing, Carl Overstreet; slot, Carmine Vito. This undoubtedly is the first - - and only - - four aircraft formation flown in U-2 airplanes.
Photo taken by Hervey Stockman

Miscellaneous orders from the ole footlocker

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