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Last Updated March 26, 2005

Family, friends honor missing pilot for CIA
Marine, sister are memorialized

Norman Schwartz was remembered as a pilot with a "can-do attitude." PHOTOS BY KEITH WILLIAMS, THE COURIER-JOURNAL Marine Capt. Jenny Potter presented a U.S. flag to Betty Kirzinger, sister of Norman Schwartz, who died during a mission over China in 1952. Schwartz and his sister Katherine Gordon were memorialized at Evergreen Cemetery. Rod Smith, chief of special operations for the CIA, recognized Schwartz's efforts during yesterday's service. Schwartz's remains have not been found.

During the Cold War, he was part of a nameless group of men and women who waged a largely covert war against communism in Asia.

Yesterday, family and friends remembered Norman Schwartz, a Louisville native and decorated Marine pilot who disappeared 51 years ago when his plane was shot down in China near the North Korean border. His remains have never been found.

More than 50 people attended a service at Evergreen Cemetery's Normandy Chapel to honor Schwartz and memorialize his sister, Katherine Gordon of Madison, N.C., who died March 1. Gordon, a former Louisville teacher, also served in the military in the Navy's WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service).

During yesterday's service, Rod Smith, chief of special operations for the CIA, recognized Schwartz's efforts on behalf of his country.

"None of us come to work without being mindful every day of the torch that was passed to us by men like Norm," Smith said.

Following yesterday's service, an internment was held, with taps played for Gordon and Schwartz and two American flags given to family members by military personnel representing the Marines and Navy.

"We have closure as much as we can possibly get right now," said Schwartz's brother, Gene Schwarz of Louisville. "But we hope to have more closure when we get his remains back to the United States and back to his family."

Since the 1980s, Schwartz's nephew, Erik Kirzinger, has lobbied for U.S. and Chinese support to find his uncle's remains and return them.

Last summer, the Chinese government gave permission for a team from the U.S. Army's Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii to search the crash site. The team recovered fragments from a plane, but no human remains.

Last month, the U.S. government asked China for permission to return to excavate the site. Kirzinger said yesterday that he and his family are waiting for Chinese officials to respond.

Norman Schwartz grew up with his parents and six brothers and sisters in the Camp Taylor area. In addition to Gene Schwarz, he is survived by his sister, Betty Kirzinger of Madison, N.C.

At the time of his death, Schwartz flew for Civil Air Transport, an organization operated by Gen. Claire Chennault and Whiting Willauer after World War II that used surplus military aircraft in secret anti-communist missions in Asia.

In November 1952, Schwartz was flying a C-47 with Robert Snoddy of Eugene, Ore., and two CIA officers, Richard Fecteau and Jack Downey, when the plane was shot down. The crew were attempting to pick up a Nationalist Chinese agent near the North Korean border in the Manchuria region.

Schwartz, who was 30, and Snoddy died and reportedly were buried at the site. Fecteau and Downey were tried as spies in China and given 20-year prison sentences. U.S. officials would say only that the plane had crashed into the Sea of Japan during a routine trip between Korea and Japan.

Schwartz's family initially accepted the story but later grew suspicious after reading foreign news accounts of the incident. It wasn't until the 1970s, when Fecteau and Downey were released, that Washington admitted it had carried out spy missions in China.

Hugh Grundy of Springfield, Ky., who was the former president of Civil Air Transport/Air American, said yesterday at the service that Schwartz was a capable pilot with a "can-do attitude" who was among Chennault's favorites.

Former Louisville Mayor Dave Armstrong, who worked with Metro Council member Cyril Allgeier to have a Cold War memorial erected in Camp Taylor Park in memory of veterans such as Schwartz, called yesterday's service a "recognition of commitment."

"It's our hope as a city and as family and colleagues that we will bring the remains of Norman back," he said. "Until that day, we will never forget."

Following the service, Betty Kirzinger and Gene Schwarz said the years since the family received a telegram informing them that their brother was missing have been "very difficult."

"We didn't know for so long what might have happened. Our country wasn't admitting anything," said Kirzinger, who wants her brother remembered as a "hero and a good person."

"It's going to be a blessing to have his remains come back," Gene Schwarz said.