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Hello again, everyone. Welcome to software, radio, software, radio on time on target. I'm your host this morning, Steve Bellisbury. Joining us today, we have a very, very special guest, Francis Gary Powers Jr.

The son of Gary Powers, who everyone knows was the YouTube pilot that was shot down over the Soviet Union back during the Cold War.

And Gary is a very interesting person in his own right. He was born during the Cold War in California.

He graduated from Cal State LA with the degree in philosophy as a master's from George Mason University, as well as another master's from Adam State University in Colorado.

He's the founder and chairman emeritus of the Cold War Museum, which is located at the Cold War Army base, Ben Hill Farms, just outside of Washington, DC.

Well, it used to be back in the day. It's probably a lot farther now because it's traffic, but he founded a museum in 1996 to honor Cold War veterans and preserve Cold War history.

So, before we get into all of that, we want to welcome Gary to the podcast. Gary, thanks for taking the time this morning. It is our pleasure.

Well, thank you very much, Steve, for inviting me to be on. I look forward to chatting you with you about Cold War history.

Yeah, absolutely. And let's jump right into this. You know, the son of Gary Powers, you grew up, I mean, you knew somewhat about your father.

But, you know, after reading your book, and I want to mention this before you only further, the Gary's book is called Spy Pilot, Francis Gary Powers, the U2 incident, and a controversial Cold War legacy.

And in the book, you talk about, you know, not really knowing the true story about your dad. And, you know, what was it like for you growing up while your dad was still alive?

For me growing up in this family, it was normal. I mean, I knew dad had been shot down and prisoned, exchanged by the Soviets for a Russian spy.

But I didn't realize that was special. I was a kid. I just didn't comprehend the significance of it when I was growing up.

When dad died on August 1st of 77 in a helicopter crash while working for NBC television, that's when I became aware of the historical significance of what he had gone through.

But by that time, it was too late to ask him questions since he had just passed away. And so throughout high school, that was a little challenging for me.

But then in college, I came out of my shell. I was curious. I started doing research. And over the last 30 plus years, I've done all this research, talking to his contemporaries, getting oral and written histories from people that knew him that had been unpublished, getting FOIA or declassified files from the CIA and the Air Force.

I really put this puzzle together and found out the truth of what took place. And that was the whole goal when I started doing my research was to find out the truth of what took place so I knew how to answer questions.

As a kid, I would get these questions from people. My peers at school or teachers or even strangers asking about my father, oh, your Gary Powers son, did he do this? Did he do that? Why didn't he do this or that?

And at the time, I didn't know the answers. So over the last 30 plus years, I figured out the answers. And my book was published in 2019 and it sets the record straight.

Yeah, and it was funny because you talk about this in the book and how there was such a, I guess, diverse, I guess, kind of thought over whether your father did something wrong or he was a hero.

And I remember growing up in that era, as we talked offline, you know, in elementary school, we were under the impression that he had done something wrong. There was something, you know, for teachers in elementary school gave us the impression that your dad had did something wrong.

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