Born April 6, 1914, Lt. Col. Fred Silverman served in the United States Air Force (and its predecessors, the Army Air Corp. and Army Air Forces) from 1935 until 1966, when he retired from the military. Serving in the U.S. military through three wars and a large part of the cold war, Lt. Col. Silverman spent most of his career in the Strategic Air Command, flying on the crews of B-36s, B-47s and B-52s as an electronic warfare officer, navigator and bombardier.
Lt. Col. Fred Silverman was an expert and a pioneer practitioner in the area of Electronic Counter Measures (ECM), a form of electronic warfare which includes any sort of electrical or electronic device designed to fool radar, sonar, or other detection systems. Lt. Col. Silverman specialized in the use of radar countermeasures called "chaff," in which aircraft or other targets spread a cloud of small, aluminum strips cut to one-half of the target radar's wavelength. When dropped, the strips would give a strong echo, appearing as an aircraft on radar screens. Opposing defenses would find it almost impossible to pick out the "real" aircraft from the false echoes.
After his retirement from the Air Force, Lt. Col .Silverman continued in private industry to pioneer further advances in ECM technology including, for example, the use of drones. He passed away in September of 1994, leaving behind his loving family who are proud to contribute to the Museum in his name.