When Dick Fortenberry was a young man in the mid-1950s, he saw a newsreel showing men in France doing free-fall parachuting out of an airplane. That means jumping out of the plane without a chute-to-plane device to open the parachute, dropping about 20 seconds before they opened their chutes.

That inspired him.

By 1959, he was an original member of the Army Parachute Team the Golden Knights. By August 1962, he was smiling at the world as the first skydiver to grace the cover of Sports Illustrated. By 1964, he had won medals in two world parachuting competitions and three national competitions.

In many more ways, including making 1,500 jumps in a short period of time, he has been a notable part of skydiving history. Because of this, the 78-year-old Savannah resident will be inducted into the Skydiving Hall of Fame in Eloy, Ariz., in October.

He documented the history of skydiving, and his involvement in it, in his book "No ETA: The Pioneering Days of Skydiving," published in 2011.

In 1958, at age 18, Fortenberry joined the Army and went from basic training directly to the 77th Special Forces Group, also known as the Green Berets.

"I went through jump school in 1958 at Fort Bragg, and continued to go through unit training and individual training. Then I went to parachute rigger school to become a rigger for the 77th Special Forces."

During that time, the Army recognized skydiving as a sport. Until then, it was a court martial offense for military jumpers to free fall for fun, he said. The military only used static line parachutes, which are hooked to the plane and open as you leap.

"Then we started skydiving" for fun on weekends, but still representing the military, Fortenberry said. He became one of 19 original members of the Strategic Army Corps Parachute Team formed in 1959. There was a competition team, a demonstration team and a research and development team.

"We interacted with the other teams, but my specialty was competition," Fortenberry said.

That year, he attended his first national competition in Valley Forge, Penn., as a member of the Special Warfare Center Parachute Club. The competition was open to military and civilian jumpers. He entered an accuracy competition and won.

He was and original member of the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School Parachute Club. He left that club and went to the STRAC Parachute Team when it became the U.S. Army Team.

"That's when we found a new name for it," Fortenberry said. The Golden Knights name came from the Army West Point Black Knights football team and the Army's colors of black and gold. In 1961, The U.S. Army Parachute Team became known as the Golden Knights and Fortenberry was an original member of that.

From 1960-64, he assisted in establishing 25 world accuracy records.

In April 1960, the Golden Knights went to El Centro, Calif., and made the first-ever jump from 30,000 feet without a drogue chute, which keeps a jumper stable from spinning and tumbling, he said.

"Without drogue chutes, we made the first seven-man baton pass in the air from 30,000 feet," he said. "At that time, passing the baton between skydivers was popular. We did that at air shows and had a plaque on the baton and would give it to the attending dignitaries."

He went on to win the national championship in skydiving in 1961, 1962 and 1963, he said. "No one had done that three years in a row," he added.

The world championship skydiving competition took place every two years.

In 1960, in Sophia, Bulgaria, he did the first dead-center landing ever recorded. He won silver, or second place, overall that year.

In 1962, in Orange, Mass., he won third place overall.

"I captained the whole team," he said. "I trained the women's team."

It was the United States' first civilian team of five women in an international competition, and they won gold overall.

In 1964, Fortenberry competed in his last world championship skydiving event in Leutkirch, Germany, against jumpers from 26 countries. He won the overall world championship.

He made about 15 more jumps, then left the Golden Knights.

Over time, because of his skydiving, he could be seen on popular television game shows "To Tell the Truth" and "What's My Line?" and the Barry Gray radio talk show. He also was written about in Time magazine. And in 1962, he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

"After that there was only one place to go and that was down," he said with a laugh. He went to flight school in 1964 and graduated in June 1965. "I went to flight school and flew Huey gunship helicopters in Vietnam."

Primary training was at Camp Wolters in Texas and advanced training was at Fort Rucker in Alabama. He earned the Bronze Star and 26 air medals, two of which were for valor, during his Vietnam tour.

In 1968, he left Army as a warrant officer. He began a 25-year civilian career as a corporate pilot, the last 22 flying Gulfstreams and other aircraft for Mobil Oil Co.

In 1974, the World Air Sport Federation or Fédération Aéronautique Internationale voted for Fortenberry as the first American to receive the highest honor in parachuting - the Diplome Leonardo Da Vinci.

As a corporate pilot, he came to Savannah every six months for recurrent training on Gulfstreams, he said, and that's when he fell in love with the city. It also helped that his twin daughters joined the military, were assigned to Hunter Army Airfield and flew Black Hawk helicopters, each serving three combat tours of duty overseas. Jennifer Anderson and Amanda Matthews are also both accomplished skydivers.

He doesn't miss skydiving, because he was constantly training. "Everybody else was out jumping for fun. Every jump I made was turns, loops and accuracy, training and competing. After four years of that, I was burned out."

He does miss the people and the technology.

Similarly, he doesn't miss being a corporate pilot, but misses the people and technology. He also has been nominated for induction into the Georgia Aviation Hall of Fame next year.

He doesn't deny that there is something about being way up high.

"One of the things about jumping," he said, "you have all the excitement about jumping, the noise of the people and the noise of the plane, and then the wind as you are falling 120 mph. But when you open the chute, being in the air is the quietest thing you'll hear in your life."

More info

Skydiving Hall of Fame: www.skydivingmuseum.org

Georgia Aviation Hall of Fame: www.gaaviationhalloffame.com