Dino Brugioni, a Jefferson City native, died recently of natural causes, after a life of public service that included a significant role in the Cuban missile crisis.
A former student of Jefferson City High School and Junior College, Brugioni, born in Bevier, died Sept. 25 at his home in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
While in Jefferson City, Brugioni worked his way through college by working at Central Dairy and running elevators in various buildings in the Capitol, before joining the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1941 where he flew 66 bombing missions and several reconnaissance missions. He was awarded the Purple Heart, among other medals, before eventually joining the newly created Central Intelligence Agency in 1948.
While with the CIA, Brugioni became one of the founders of the National Photographic Interpretation Center, which was responsible for finding Russian nuclear missiles in Cuba aimed at the United States.
"Oct. 27 was the day I will never forget," Brugioni said in an interview with the News Tribune last year. "That morning, I told my boss that each site had four pads with a total of 24 pads, and they are operational, meaning that there could be 24 missiles coming into the U.S. within 24 hours. ... The president was very concerned. I called my wife and told her that if I call her again, be ready to put the kids in the car and get to Jeff City because we would be at war and it would be a nuclear war."
After that incident, the United States had sent around 50 B-52 bombers carrying nuclear weapons to the North Pole to destroy 70 Soviet cities. Luckily, the Russians backed down. The Cold War ended, and the Soviet Union was dismantled.
Brugioni authored two books on his work with the CIA, "Eyeball to Eyeball" and "Eyes in the Sky," as well as the book "Photo Fakery" about determining the validity of photographs.
According to Brugioni's obituary, he will be interred at Arlington National Cemetery in spring 2016.
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