William G. King Jr.

William Gregg King Jr. (14 December 191821 June 2009) was a brigadier general in the United States Air Force (USAF). After service with the United States Army in World War II, he joined the USAF in 1947. He helped establish the Eastern Test Range at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was project officer for the SM-62 Snark cruise missile, helped initiate the WS-117L military satellite program, worked on the SAMOS reconnaissance satellite, commanded the Air Force Satellite Control Facility, and was director of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) Project A.

Early life and career

William Gregg King Jr. was born in Topeka, Kansas, on 14 December 1918. He graduated from Dodge City High School in 1937, and entered Kansas State University where he received military training with the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC). King's education was interrupted in 1941 by World War II, when he was commissioned through the ROTC as a second lieutenant in the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps and called up for active duty.

Major General Thomas F. Deppe (left) applauds at the unveiling of the Brigadier General William G. King trophy for the command's best systems wing. King (right) and his wife Mary are seeing the trophy for the first time. In 1957, King became the weapons systems project officer for the SM-62 Snark intercontinental range surface-to-surface cruise missile, and he oversaw its deployment at Presque Isle Air Force Base in Maine. In July 1959 he joined the Space Systems Division in Los Angeles, where he worked in the project office of the SAMOS reconnaissance satellite, which became the Office of Special Projects of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) in 1961. He died on 21 June 2009.