This title examines the remarkable life of Benjamin O. Davis Jr. Readers will learn about Davis's family background, childhood, education, military career, and societal contributions. Covered in detail are Davis's leadership roles at the Tuskegee Institute and in the military during World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Color photos, detailed maps, and informative sidebars accompany engaging text. Features include a timeline, facts, additional resources, web sites, a glossary, a bibliography, and an index. Military Heroes is a series in Essential Library, an imprint of ABDO Publishing Company.

Set against the backdrop of twentieth-century America, against the social fabric of segregation and the broad canvas of foreign war, Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.: American tells a compelling story of personal achievement against formidable odds. Born into an era when potential was measured according to race, Davis was determined to be judged by his character and deeds—to succeed as an American, and not to fail because of color. With twelve million citizens —the black population of the United States—pulling for him, Davis entered West Point in 1932, resolved to become an officer even though official military directives stated that blacks were decidedly inferior, lacking in courage, superstitious, and dominated by moral and character weaknesses. “Silenced” by his peers, for four years spoken to only in the line of duty, David did not falter. He graduated 35th in a class of 276 and requested assignment to the Army Air Corps, then closed to blacks. He went on to lead the 99th Pursuit Squadron and the 332nd Fighter Group—units known today as the Tuskegee Airmen—into air combat over North Africa and Italy during World War II. His performance, and that of his men, enabled the Air Force to integrate years before civilian society confronted segregation. Thereafter, in a distinguished career in the Far East, Europe, and the United States, Davis commanded both black and white units. Davis’s story is interwoven with often painful accounts of the discrimination he and his wife, Agatha, endured as a fact of American military and civilian life. Traveling across the country, unable to find food and lodging, they were often forced to make their way nonstop. Once on base, they were denied use of clubs and, in the early days, were never allowed to attend social activities. Though on-base problems were solved by President Truman’s integration of the military in 1949, conditions in the civilian community continued, eased but not erased by enactment of President Johnson’s legislative program in the 1960s. Overseas, however, where relations were unfettered by racism, the Davises enjoyed numerous friendships within the military and with such foreign dignitaries as President and Madame Chiang Kai-shek. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., retired in 1970 as a three-star general. His autobiography, capturing the fortitude and spirit with which he and his wife met the pettiness of segregation, bears out Davis’s conviction that discrimination—both within the military and in American society—reflects neither this nation’s ideals nor the best use of its human resources.

Once an obscure piece of World War II history, the Tuskegee Airmen are now among the most celebrated and documented aviators in military history. With this growth in popularity, however, have come a number of inaccurate stories and assumptions. Misconceptions about the Tuskegee Airmen refutes fifty-five of these myths, correcting the historical record while preserving the Airmen’s rightful reputation as excellent servicemen. The myths examined include: the Tuskegee Airmen never losing a bomber to an enemy aircraft; that Lee Archer was an ace; that Roscoe Brown was the first American pilot to shoot down a German jet; that Charles McGee has the highest total combat missions flown; and that Daniel “Chappie” James was the leader of the “Freeman Field Mutiny.” Historian Daniel Haulman, an expert on the Airmen with many published books on the subject, conclusively disproves these misconceptions through primary documents like monthly histories, daily narrative mission reports, honor-awarding orders, and reports on missing crews, thereby proving that the Airmen were praiseworthy, even without embellishments to their story.

As the country's first African American military pilots, the Tuskegee Airmen fought in World War II on two fronts: against the Axis powers in the skies over Europe and against Jim Crow racism and segregation at home. Although the pilots flew more than 15,000 sorties and destroyed more than 200 German aircraft, their most far-reaching achievement defies quantification: delivering a powerful blow to racial inequality and discrimination in American life. In this inspiring account of the Tuskegee Airmen, historian J. Todd Moye captures the challenges and triumphs of these brave pilots in their own words, drawing on more than 800 interviews recorded for the National Park Service's Tuskegee Airmen Oral History Project. Denied the right to fully participate in the U.S. war effort alongside whites at the beginning of World War II, African Americans--spurred on by black newspapers and civil rights organizations such as the NAACP--compelled the prestigious Army Air Corps to open its training programs to black pilots, despite the objections of its top generals. Thousands of young men came from every part of the country to Tuskegee, Alabama, in the heart of the segregated South, to enter the program, which expanded in 1943 to train multi-engine bomber pilots in addition to fighter pilots. By the end of the war, Tuskegee Airfield had become a small city populated by black mechanics, parachute packers, doctors, and nurses. Together, they helped prove that racial segregation of the fighting forces was so inefficient as to be counterproductive to the nation's defense. Freedom Flyers brings to life the legacy of a determined, visionary cadre of African American airmen who proved their capabilities and patriotism beyond question, transformed the armed forces--formerly the nation's most racially polarized institution--and jump-started the modern struggle for racial equality.

Documenting the racial integration of the Air Force from the end of World War II to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, retired Air Force colonel Alan L. Gropman contends that the service desegregated itself not for moral or political reasons but to improve military effectiveness. First published in 1977, this second edition charts policy changes to date. 31 photos.

During the first sixty years following World War II, a powerful myth grew up claiming that the Tuskegee Airmen, the only black American military pilots in the war, had been the only fighter escort group never to have lost a bomber to enemy aircraft fire. The myth was enshrined in articles, books, museum exhibits, television programs, and films. In actuality, the all-black 332d Fighter Group flew at least seven bomber escort missions, of the 179 it flew for the Fifteenth Air Force between early June 1944 and the end of April 1945, in which one or more of the bombers it escorted was shot down by enemy aircraft. In fact, 27 bombers the 332d Fighter Group was assigned to escort were shot down by enemy aircraft during the war, most during the summer of 1944. This article explores how the "never lost a bomber" myth originated and grew, and then refutes it conclusively with careful reference to primary source documents located at the Air Force Historical Research Agency. Among those documents are the daily mission reports of the Tuskegee Airmen's 332d Fighter Group (which indicates the bomb groups the Tuskegee Airmen escorted, and where and when), the daily mission reports of the bomb groups the Tuskegee Airmen escorted (which indicates if bombers were shot down by enemy aircraft at the times and places the 332d Fighter Group was escorting them), and the missing aircrew reports, which show which aircraft were lost, including the type of aircraft, the unit to which it belonged, when and where it went down, and whether it went down by enemy aircraft fire. By piecing together these documents, the author not only proves that sometimes bombers under the escort of the Tuskegee Airmen were shot down by enemy aircraft, but when and where those losses occurred, and to which groups they belonged.