Frank Luke

Frank Luke Jr. (May 19, 1897 – September 29, 1918) was an American fighter ace credited with 19 aerial victories, ranking him second among United States Army Air Service (USAAS) pilots during World War I, after Eddie Rickenbacker. Luke was the first airman to receive the Medal of Honor and first USAAS ace in a day. Stephen Skinner's book The Stand notes that he received a posthumous promotion to first lieutenant.

Because of his arrogance and occasional tendencies to fly alone and disobey orders, Luke was disliked by some of his peers and superiors. But the 27th was under standing orders to destroy German observation balloons. Because of this, Luke, along with his close friend Lieutenant Joseph Frank Wehner, continually volunteered to attack these important targets although they were heavily defended by anti-aircraft guns on the ground. The two pilots began a string of victories together, with Luke attacking the balloons and Wehner flying protective cover. Wehner was killed in action on September 18, 1918, by Georg von Hantelmann in a dogfight with Fokker D.VIIs, which were attacking Luke. Luke then shot down two of these D.VIIs, two balloons, and a Halberstadt; the last "credit" enabled Luke to achieve his 13th official kill—a Halberstadt C-type observation plane of Flieger Abteilung 36.

Between September 12 and 29, Luke was credited with shooting down 14 German balloons and four airplanes: Luke achieved these 18 victories during just 10 sorties in eight days, a feat unsurpassed by any pilot in World War I. When he returned to the 1st Pursuit Group's base at Rembercourt the next day, he was confronted by Captain Alfred A. Grant, his squadron's commanding officer. Despite being under threat of arrest by Grant for absence without leave, Luke took off without authorization and flew to a forward airbase at Verdun, where his sympathetic group commander, Major Hartney, canceled the arrest order and gave Luke tacit approval to continue his balloon hunting.

The citation contained errors attributable to confused accounts from French witnesses to Luke's final flight, and to a staff officer's re-write of the original write-up, which emphasized the numerous high-risk missions he flew between September 12 and 29. Reports that he was intercepted by German fighters, strafed enemy troops before his forced landing; and was "surrounded on all sides" were literal misinterpretations of French testimony and became part of the mythology that grew up around the event. Frank Luke was named the Class Exemplar of the United States Air Force Academy's class of 2010. In the 2006 movie Flyboys, James Franco's leading character Blaine Rawlings is inspired by Frank Luke. Frank Luke Street near Addison Airport in Addison, Texas, is named after Luke. In the 2023 Chinese balloon incident, the military aircraft that shot down the balloon were call-signed "FRANK01" and "FRANK02," in honor of Luke's reputation as a balloon-buster.