Blake, Gordon A. (Gordon Aylesworth), 1910-1997

Gordon Aylesworth Blake (b. 1910, Charles City, Iowa-d. Sept. 1, 1997), Lieutenant General in the U.S. Air Force, graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1931 and completed training in the Flying Schools the next year. Assigned to Hawaii, he was communications officer of the 18th Composite Wing. On December 7, 1941, he was base operations officer at Hickam Field, Pearl Harbor, and was awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action that day. Blake spent the first few months of World War II supervising operation of the airplane ferry route to Australia; he later returned to communications work and commanded the Army Airways Communications System in the Pacific for the rest of the War. Later at Air Force Headquarters he served as director of communications while many changes to the U.S. Air Force system for global communications and navigation were carried out. In 1962 General Blake assumed the position of director, National Security Agency, Fort Meade, Maryland. He retired in June 1965.