Colonel Francis "Duke" Xavier Kane, Ph.D., USAF, retired, (December 12, 1918 – July 18, 2013[1] ) was the space planner and engineer responsible for the design concept of the Global Positioning System (GPS).
"[3] Colonel Kane formed the 621B team consisting of Air Force engineers and Aerospace Corporation contractors in Los Angeles to lay the foundation for GPS development.
The engineering concept addressed that a minimum of 24 satellites would be required for global coverage, at an altitude of 10,000 nautical miles, at 55 degrees inclination, and powered by hybrid solar and battery energy sources.
"These men included of Phil Diamond, Peter W. Soule, James B. Woodford, Alfred Bogen, Richard Dutcher, Howard F. Marx, and Hideyoshi Nakamura.
The aircraft's crewmembers could then obtain a three-dimensional position by measuring four distinct differences in the signals' arrival times and then adding these to a clock connected to a quartz oscillator.
On May 16, 2019, Col Kane's name was inscribed on the Schriever Wall of Honor at Los Angeles AFB, CA to commemorate his life-long contributions to the space enterprise.
They also invited Dr. Stefan Possony, science fiction writers Poul Anderson and Robert Heinlein, Writer/engineer G. Harry Stine, and members of Edward Teller's team.
During the summer of 2011, Duke collaborated with his friend Hu Davis (SolarHigh.org and Vehicle Manager Lunar Capsule 5, "Eagle", Apollo 11 and a participant in the 1980 space policy preparations; and a group of high school students led by Evan Gray from RAM STEM Academy in San Antonio, Texas on the future of space exploration including Space-Based Solar Power, Lunar, and Mars missions.
Duke's intellectual gift was a deep and impassioned ability to think, dream, imagine, question, reason, plan, and share his vision so that others could carry these designs into the future.