Bill "Smokey" Slover took his first airplane ride in 1940 in a Waco aircraft that belonged to Jack Colson in Middlesboro, Kentucky. He started learning to fly aircraft with his father in 1947 out of Cook’s Aero Service, McGhee-Tyson Airport in Knoxville, and the Oak Ridge/Oliver Springs Airport. He served in the United States Air Force in the Strategic Air Command as a simulator instructor in the B-47s and flew for the United States Corps of Engineers and CIA, flying high altitude photogrammetric engineering in one-of-a-kind AT-11, T-28, and C-180 aircraft photographing the Mississippi River, lakes, flood areas and drug hot spots in the United States, Mexico and South America. Smokey has served as captain, chief pilot, and director of corporate flight operations, as well as simulator instructor in Class C and D simulators. He has logged over 18,000 hours.
