Born in Lexington, in 1921, Gayle was a natural aviator and was able to obtain his pilot's license before he was old enough to get a driver's license. With the start of the war, he joined the AirCorps on 12/12/41. Gayle was selected to be a fighter pilot instructor. His goal was to fly in combat, but due to the number of hours he had, he became a bomber pilot. Arriving in England in 1944, he became the lead pilot of the 493rd Bomb Group, 3rd Division, flying a B-24 he named the "Kentucky Kloudhopper." 

His first mission was on June 6th, 1944, D-Day. On November 2nd, 1944, his plane was shot down after dropping its ordinance on a synthetic oil refinery over Germany. Gayle's insistence that all of his crew wear their parachutes at all times saved most of the crew. Now a POW, the camp was liberated in April 1945, and Gayle was sent back to the states and was honorably discharged with the rank of Captain. He earned many medals, including the Air Medal with two Oak Leaf Clusters, the Distinguished Unit Badge, the Purple Heart, the European-African-Middle Eastern Service Medal, the Irving Airchute Caterpillar Club (for bailing out of a burning airplane), and the Prisoner of War Medal. In 2017, after 73 years, he was also awarded the French Legion of Honor.

Gayle entered the Ohio State University to study veterinary medicine and returned to Lexington in 1949 as a large animal veterinarian. Later he built his own successful small animal hospital and practice.