Edward Howard Smith was born in 1911 and grew up with aviation. As a teenager finding an engineless Jenny on a Texas prairie, he turned it into a flight trainer by balancing it on a post.
As a young man, beginning in 1936, he worked tirelessly to ready the Army Air Corps for WWII, supervising operations which kept thousands of aircraft flying at training bases in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas.
At mid-century, E. Howard Smith chaired the Inter-Service Supply Support Group which worked to merge the supply systems of the Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marines and thus greatly increased Defense effectiveness. He was then tasked with making computerization of military supply work.
E. Howard Smith also managed a number of special programs. One was the photographic payload suite for the U-2 and other special assets. The continuous information flow from this intelligence gathering system helped to keep the Cold War from boiling over.
The work done by E. Howard Smith on this program was recognized by President Dwight D. Eisenhower when he called Mr. Smith to the White House in 1957 to unveil this previously highly secret project and to propose the "Open Skies" Treaty, which has just recently been put into effect.
Even in retirement, E. Howard Smith continued to serve his country by organizing the massive effort to preserve the integrity of a national strategic asset: the unique Land, Sea, and Air Base BROOKLEY FIELD at Mobile, Alabama. Through great personal effort and financial sacrifice, the effort succeeded. The massive runways on the edge of Mobile Bay are still open and available for use. The base is being used today for air cargo and as a commercial jet maintenance facility.
On this (2003), the 100th Anniversary of Flight, he still pauses to gaze upward as planes pass overhead. Edward Howard Smith, throughout his long life, truly has been an Air and Space Leader.