Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from how Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and there's Charles W Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there.
Speaker 1: So this is stuff you should know about the Tuskegee Airman.
Speaker 1: That's right, one of our Every year we try to
Speaker 1: do a Black History Month podcast at least one. And
Speaker 1: uh did mean to keep everyone on suspense this year
Speaker 1: right here at the end of the month, but this
Speaker 1: one we were getting this one put together. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: is a good one. Yeah, and it's uh, I mean,
Speaker 1: this is what we typically like to do, stuff that's
Speaker 1: like your very little known history. I would say Tuskegee
Speaker 1: Airman is is does not fall into the little known category,
Speaker 1: yet still undersung. I think even after two not very
Speaker 1: good feature films. Oh did you see any of them?
Speaker 1: I had? The only one I'm familiar with was um,
Speaker 1: I think it's just called the Tuskegee Airman, and I
Speaker 1: kept confusing it with Memphis Bell. Yeah, Tuskegee Airman was
Speaker 1: an HBO movie with Larry Fishburne and other Malcolm Jamal Warner.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, good seeing him, sure always, but uh,
Speaker 1: I mean that one was okay, but I think better
Speaker 1: than the Red Tails movie was. Uh yeah, Red Tails
Speaker 1: just wasn't very good, which is a shame. Sure. But
Speaker 1: speaking of shame, let's talk about how the Tuskegee Airmen retreated.
Speaker 1: Just to get started, Um, we should kind of briefly
Speaker 1: go over like the history of African Americans in the military,
Speaker 1: because where we really pick up with our story the
Speaker 1: Inner War period between World War One and World War Two. Um,
Speaker 1: the military was very much segregated still officially, just like
Speaker 1: America was. It was law. Segregation was law at the time.
Speaker 1: But that's not to say that, um, African Americans hadn't
Speaker 1: served in the military and US previously, uh, in some
Speaker 1: pretty substantial roles too. Yeah, I mean dating back to
Speaker 1: like when they were not even considered Americans, Like when
Speaker 1: when uh, I mean, I keep wanting to say black Americans,
Speaker 1: but they were not considered that, like during the Revolutionary War, um,
Speaker 1: on both sides. Actually, as you'll learn in a short
Speaker 1: stuff about black loyalists, it's interesting that slaves fought for
Speaker 1: and against the revolution, really interesting all the way up through.
Speaker 1: And you know, we should do podcasts on a lot
Speaker 1: of these things, but they fought in the War of
Speaker 1: eighteen twelve. They fought as the Buffalo Soldiers in many
Speaker 1: of the conflicts against Native Americans all the way up
Speaker 1: through World War One, where they joined the army, despite
Speaker 1: the fact that there was segregation at home and in
Speaker 1: the military um, notably the Harlem hell Fighters who fought
Speaker 1: with the French, and even though Americans did not fully
Speaker 1: recognize that as an accomplishment, the French government did. Ironically, Yeah,
Speaker 1: if that sounds kind of weird to you, the the
Speaker 1: American military had an all black regiment and said here,
Speaker 1: you take them to to France, and France was like, sure,
Speaker 1: we'll take them, We'll use them and awarded them the
Speaker 1: Quada Gair for Heroism in combat um, which is like,
Speaker 1: if you'll remember our Native American code talker episode. France,
Speaker 1: especially World War One, had kind of a history of
Speaker 1: awarding and recognizing bravery among minorities that were just totally
Speaker 1: shown to the United States, you know, yeah, And I
Speaker 1: mean there was even a study conducted by the Army
Speaker 1: War College in nineteen five about the fitness and suitability
Speaker 1: of black soldiers in the military, and it was just
Speaker 1: it was brutal and racist, and you know, just said
Speaker 1: the worst things you can imagine about the lack of
Speaker 1: fitness for a black man to serve for the Americans
Speaker 1: in the American military. Yeah, and I think this Army
Speaker 1: War College study was basically just a an official position
Speaker 1: paper that that summed up the sentiments among military officers
Speaker 1: and most of the military at the time. Um that
Speaker 1: they just wanted to get it down on paper. It's
Speaker 1: like an official position so that that it wouldn't be eroded,
Speaker 1: that they could say this is the military's official position
Speaker 1: on black people. And essentially what it said was black
Speaker 1: people are not intellectually capable of receiving like theoretical training.
Speaker 1: They they can probably be you know, um worked into
Speaker 1: uh like combat troops, but it's going to take a
Speaker 1: lot more effort and you really have to dumb it
Speaker 1: down and then maybe you can organize them into a
Speaker 1: combat troop. But really, we don't have high hopes for this,
Speaker 1: so we should probably just not mess with the whole
Speaker 1: thing and just keep it in all white military. Yeah.
Speaker 1: That that was And despite all of this, there were
Speaker 1: still black soldiers who a achieved in the military, uh,
Speaker 1: most notably in the reason we bring this Uh, this
Speaker 1: gentleman up. Benjamin O'Davis sr Uh became the first black
Speaker 1: general in the U. S. Military. He figures prominently in
Speaker 1: the Tuskegee Airmen story, and that his son, Benjamin Davis Jr. Uh, Well,
Speaker 1: we'll we'll tell you what he did, but he figured
Speaker 1: very prominently in the formation and story of the Tuskegee Airmen. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's huge, he's um one of the leading figures, and
Speaker 1: he gets most of the glory and the press and everything,
Speaker 1: but there were plenty of others who who served quite valiantly. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that that's like the briefest of summations. I definitely
Speaker 1: think we should do one on the Buffalo Soldiers at
Speaker 1: some point. Tots agree like, I don't understand why Bob
Speaker 1: Marley drew that that um line between Prasta's and Buffalo soldiers.
Speaker 1: I'm not kidding, Like I know that it sounds like
Speaker 1: a hilarious thing that Josh would say, but I have
Speaker 1: always always wondered that, like what is he talking about?
Speaker 1: What's the you know, were they were they rostas or
Speaker 1: something like that, or is it do they have the
Speaker 1: spirit of the roster vice versa. I'd love to get
Speaker 1: to the bottom of that. Alright, let's do it. Okay, alright,
Speaker 1: I'm excited. So that brings us to World War two. UM.
Speaker 1: And like you said before, segregation is still, uh the
Speaker 1: law in the United States. Race racism was rampant, and
Speaker 1: it still is in a lot of places in this country,
Speaker 1: but back then very much rampant. Uh. And despite all that,
Speaker 1: there were still plenty of African Americans who wanted to
Speaker 1: be in the army and wanted to fly planes. And
Speaker 1: this was pre Air Force. It was called the uh,
Speaker 1: the Army Air Corps. Yes, and we should say like
Speaker 1: this was extremely prestigious to be in the Army. Air
Speaker 1: Corps was far and away the most prestigious branch of
Speaker 1: the military, although it wasn't technically its own branch, but
Speaker 1: the UM. The it was the most prestigious part of
Speaker 1: the military. UM because it was widely considered and rightfully
Speaker 1: so you had to be really really sharp, really smart,
Speaker 1: really quick on your toes, and just really large and
Speaker 1: in charge. Basically to fly planes in the military. It
Speaker 1: was still pretty new. It was a fairly new thing,
Speaker 1: and the whole the whole world, but also the US
Speaker 1: really looked up to aviators at the time because this
Speaker 1: is at a time where if you flew across country,
Speaker 1: you just you just made history kind of thing. So
Speaker 1: to to UM to be a part of the Army
Speaker 1: Air Corps, that was a that's a sweet plum right there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And so you know, we we move over to Alabama
Speaker 1: at the Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, and this was a
Speaker 1: place where you if you were a Black American and
Speaker 1: you wanted to go to college and get a higher education,
Speaker 1: that was a great place to start. Uh. Founded in
Speaker 1: one by Lewis Adams and Booker T. Washington UM. And
Speaker 1: during this period they had something called the Civilian Pilot
Speaker 1: Training Program, which is it was established basically to get
Speaker 1: a pool of pilots with experience, uh, people who could
Speaker 1: train pilots in the United States. And there were black
Speaker 1: colleges participating in this program, and Tuskegee was one of them. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The Howard University also had a program. UM. There were
Speaker 1: also like by this time, there was some UM black
Speaker 1: aviation history that had been established and it was small,
Speaker 1: but it was really proud, and rightfully so, because if
Speaker 1: you were an African American and you said, you know
Speaker 1: what I really look up to all these pilots too,
Speaker 1: I want to go be a pilot. The first story
Speaker 1: you went to got slammed in your face. The next
Speaker 1: door you went to, slamming in your face. And again,
Speaker 1: like the idea that black people couldn't learn how to
Speaker 1: fly a plane, So how are you going to let
Speaker 1: one fly a plane or try to teach them? What's
Speaker 1: the point? It's also probably pretty dangerous and expensive. Um,
Speaker 1: Like you could not as an African American get into
Speaker 1: a flight school. And so some of these earliest African
Speaker 1: American pilots in aviation history and like the say, like
Speaker 1: the twenties, the early thirties, like some of them were
Speaker 1: self taught. There's a guy, see Alfred Anderson, who taught
Speaker 1: himself how to fly in land planes because no flight
Speaker 1: school would teach him, no white pilots would teach him.
Speaker 1: He had to save up biz own plane and teach himself,
Speaker 1: and he became a legend. He's known as the father
Speaker 1: of black aviation in America. Yeah, and there's a like
Speaker 1: you said, a very small but proud list, Bessie Coleman.
Speaker 1: It was a black woman who went to France to
Speaker 1: learn to fly. She was black and Native American yeah,
Speaker 1: we should, she should get her an episode two. Uh.
Speaker 1: In NY two, James Banning and Thomas Allen became the
Speaker 1: first black pilots to fly across the US from l
Speaker 1: A to New York, and they as well. At least
Speaker 1: Banning could not go to flight school, so he basically
Speaker 1: found a white pilot who would give him private lessons,
Speaker 1: which is pretty remarkable. Um. And the cool thing about
Speaker 1: this story is they, uh, it cost a lot of
Speaker 1: money to fly across the country at any point, so
Speaker 1: they would stop in black communities and raise money basically
Speaker 1: and say, hey, get you know, donate some cash. You
Speaker 1: can sign our airplane and that will allow us to
Speaker 1: buy fuel to get to the next stop as we
Speaker 1: go across country. Yeah. So they became the first black
Speaker 1: pilots to fly all the way across the US as
Speaker 1: a result, which is that's pretty great. But it was
Speaker 1: like it was, it was stories like this and people
Speaker 1: like these um who were profiled in the black press
Speaker 1: at the time that I don't want to say, I
Speaker 1: guess the press was pretty much segregated at least, but
Speaker 1: for all practical purposes, African America had its own um
Speaker 1: pressed and I guess the standard establishment press was just
Speaker 1: writing stories about white people only, uh or things that
Speaker 1: related to white people. So African Americans had their own press.
Speaker 1: So stories of people like this UM spread throughout the
Speaker 1: country and inspired like whole new generations of pilots. And
Speaker 1: it also inspired, like you said, the Tuskegee Institute and
Speaker 1: Howard University and some other private schools like one formed
Speaker 1: by Cornelius Coffee and Willi Brown in Chicago to actually
Speaker 1: start training black pilots. And so this is a this
Speaker 1: is already established by the time the drumbeat, the earliest
Speaker 1: drumbeat to World War Two started and UM, the the US,
Speaker 1: led by Franklin Roosevelt, said we need to get the
Speaker 1: civilian pilot training program going because we need a pool
Speaker 1: of people who already know how to fly in case
Speaker 1: we need to turn them into military pilots as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And the the idea here with these uh, with the
Speaker 1: black journalists and newspapers was here, here's what we want.
Speaker 1: You know, there's the V for victory slogan and campaign.
Speaker 1: Let's start up something and get the word out called
Speaker 1: the double V campaign, which is basically victory in Europe
Speaker 1: but also for black soldiers, victory at home and trying
Speaker 1: to make a dent and discrimination and racism. If we
Speaker 1: go over there and we can fight and we can
Speaker 1: fly planes and serve our country, maybe that might make
Speaker 1: a difference when we come back home that we were
Speaker 1: you know, distinguished with our military service. So that was
Speaker 1: a double V campaign trying to get victory at home
Speaker 1: against racism as well as in Europe on the ground
Speaker 1: with the military. And none of this might have happened
Speaker 1: had it not been for one Eleanor Roosevelt. And maybe
Speaker 1: we should take a break there. Yeah. What does Eleanor
Speaker 1: Roosevelt have to do with all this? We'll find out
Speaker 1: in just a minute, all right, Chuck. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna say it, Eleanor Roosevelt, give it up. Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: I mean she was a great lady in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways. But uh, what she did in the case
Speaker 1: of the eventual Tuskegee Airmen was she visited Tuskegee. Um,
Speaker 1: they had a training airfield called Moten Field m O
Speaker 1: t O N. Yeah. Because remember this is like they're
Speaker 1: they're they're flying program that they already established. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: she visits, Uh, she's watching the pilots take off, fly
Speaker 1: around land, and she was like, good argue in one
Speaker 1: of those planes. That is a bitch in Eleanor Roosevelt man,
Speaker 1: And they said sure, So she went up with an
Speaker 1: African American pilot. She she went up with that, see
Speaker 1: Alfred Anderson, the self taught father of aviation. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: everything went great and she had apparently a good time,
Speaker 1: went back home and got in her husband's ear and
Speaker 1: was like, Hey, these these guys can fly planes. They're
Speaker 1: doing a great job. They're fit for military service. So
Speaker 1: let's let's get this thing going in earnest And he
Speaker 1: did so, uh in January. So here's the thing. This
Speaker 1: is what I'm on clear on, Like it's it's doubtless
Speaker 1: that Eleanor Roosevelt played a role in making sure that
Speaker 1: this this actually happened, that that um African American pilots
Speaker 1: were eligible to fly for the US military, the Army
Speaker 1: Air Corps. Right, But the timing of it I can't
Speaker 1: quite suss out either. The US military said, yeah, we're
Speaker 1: going to establish a black pilots training program at Tuskegee
Speaker 1: UH in January nine, and then Eleanor Roosevelt showed up
Speaker 1: a couple of months later to make sure that this
Speaker 1: actually happened, or she showed up and then they established it.
Speaker 1: I can't quite suss that out, but either way, she's
Speaker 1: a pretty cool lady, Like she went down and saw
Speaker 1: for herself and then came back and said, hey, we
Speaker 1: really should make this happen. Or she knew that this
Speaker 1: was happening but also could see people just dragging their feet,
Speaker 1: so she went down to shine light on the whole
Speaker 1: prosper the project, and uh, it kind of took off
Speaker 1: from there. I feel forgive the pun. Either way, she
Speaker 1: she played some sort of pretty cool role in getting
Speaker 1: it going. Yeah, and when it first started, there was
Speaker 1: sort of a joint affair between Tuskegee and the Army
Speaker 1: Air Corps as far as uh providing funding and equipment personnel.
Speaker 1: They all sort of chipped in a little bit. Um.
Speaker 1: There were flying a few different planes for training, one biplane,
Speaker 1: the Steerman PT seventeen. Eventually they were able to move
Speaker 1: over to the Tuskegee Army air Field a few miles
Speaker 1: away from Moten Field, where they had access to the
Speaker 1: P forty Warhawk, and then they were like now we're
Speaker 1: talking right, But also, I mean the initial primary training
Speaker 1: at motion field was this kind of quasi university military training,
Speaker 1: almost like an r OTC air training program. And then
Speaker 1: once you graduated from primary, you moved over to the
Speaker 1: Army field and you were full on on a military
Speaker 1: base in military life. Yeah, and this like this, this
Speaker 1: wasn't the first time that black pilots tried to apply.
Speaker 1: Like pre Tuskegee, they were applying. Recruits were applying and
Speaker 1: getting rejected every time they tried to get into the
Speaker 1: Air Corps. Eventually the N double A CP got involved,
Speaker 1: a lawsuit was filed UM. And even after that, when
Speaker 1: they started admitting black men into the Air Corps, it
Speaker 1: was ten cadets every five weeks, so they were you know,
Speaker 1: it looks like they were purposefully just sort of stymying
Speaker 1: the process through red tape and bureaucracy to still not
Speaker 1: allow them to train. Yeah. And initially so that that
Speaker 1: lawsuit UM was by a Howard University student named Yancey
Speaker 1: Williams who wanted to be a just straight up Army
Speaker 1: Air Corps cadet, and the N double A CP back
Speaker 1: back the lawsuit UM, and the result was apparently the
Speaker 1: military saying, okay, we'll just start to segregated all Black
Speaker 1: Pilot program where the n double a CP and most
Speaker 1: black leadership wanted just integration in the Army Air Corps.
Speaker 1: So they were like, okay, fine, we'll take it, but
Speaker 1: we're not like, this is not what we were going for,
Speaker 1: but we'll take this. It's better than nothing. I guess, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's probably a good way to put it. Um.
Speaker 1: But the program starts up in earnest. However few cadets
Speaker 1: they were allowing. It started to build up. These men
Speaker 1: are getting trained. Um men from the north came down
Speaker 1: and this is you know, this is an Alabama during
Speaker 1: the Jim Crow era, and there are there's one documentary
Speaker 1: called They Fought Two Wars, which basically was like, you know,
Speaker 1: they're getting trained, they're serving their country, and then they
Speaker 1: go out like on the weekend maybe for a little
Speaker 1: R and R and then met by the southern whites
Speaker 1: of Alabama who basically, you know, treated him exactly how
Speaker 1: you would expect. There was even a petition to end
Speaker 1: the program just because they were like, there are so
Speaker 1: many black men in our town. Now, we don't want
Speaker 1: them in our community, right, Surely something bad will happen
Speaker 1: to our community. Because of this, there was also apparently
Speaker 1: at least one incident where black military police were disarmed
Speaker 1: by white locals around Tuskegee civilians Yeah, who just refused
Speaker 1: to recognize that they had any authority over them whatsoever,
Speaker 1: military police or not. UM. And the at the time
Speaker 1: this this happened early on, the commander of the UM
Speaker 1: of the base, UH Ellison, James Ellison, Major James Ellison,
Speaker 1: was UM. He protested very loudly and very vocally and
Speaker 1: said this is messed up. I won't stand for this.
Speaker 1: And they said, hey Ellison, UM, yeah, we need somebody
Speaker 1: who is on the side of the recruits, but maybe
Speaker 1: not quite so much of a true believers. So you
Speaker 1: come over here with us and we're gonna relieve you
Speaker 1: of your post. And instead they brought in a guy
Speaker 1: named Colonel Noel Parrish, and he was maybe a little
Speaker 1: less gung ho about civil rights and equality and desegregation. UM.
Speaker 1: He very much withstood and stood up with the segregationist
Speaker 1: policies of the military. He didn't fight against it, but
Speaker 1: within this framework he's very much credited for UM being
Speaker 1: very fair, very even handed UM and giving like full throated,
Speaker 1: legitimately good UM quality training to these black recruits at Tuskegee,
Speaker 1: like he wasn't. They weren't getting um like subpar or
Speaker 1: or less than adequate training compared to their white counterparts elsewhere.
Speaker 1: They were getting just as good training to be trained.
Speaker 1: Like he was taking it seriously and he was being
Speaker 1: fair about it. So um, he's he's suspected for for
Speaker 1: that to to have overseen this, um this this project,
Speaker 1: I guess fairly, rather than he very easily could have
Speaker 1: gone to the other side and just dragged his feet
Speaker 1: to or put up unnecessary roadblocks and obstacles too, but
Speaker 1: he didn't. Yeah, And one of the uh, I guess
Speaker 1: you could call it one of the silver linings of
Speaker 1: the segregation in the military was there was already a
Speaker 1: ninety nine pursuit Squadron was already established, which were black
Speaker 1: cadets to get training on maintenance and tech support for UH,
Speaker 1: for the for the air patrol. So they were already
Speaker 1: in place. So by the time Tuskegee gets rolling and
Speaker 1: these cadets are being sent in to learn to fly,
Speaker 1: they were like, let's just give them the ninety nine
Speaker 1: pursuit squadron. So it was basically an all black unit,
Speaker 1: from the maintenance, to the to the technical support to
Speaker 1: the pilots that were training. Obviously not the instructors. But
Speaker 1: I get the feeling, you know, from research at that
Speaker 1: lent Um some sort of uh kind of led to
Speaker 1: camaraderie and that they had their own guys on the
Speaker 1: ground and training you know, oh yeah, yeah for sure.
Speaker 1: I mean like it was an basically an all black
Speaker 1: squadron and not all the commanders um or trainers were
Speaker 1: white like that. My favorite guy, chief Alfred Anderson UM,
Speaker 1: he was the ground commander in chief that self taught
Speaker 1: father of aviation he UM. He was the head of
Speaker 1: the ground commanders at Tuskegee. So there was a mixed
Speaker 1: But one of the things I think you kind of
Speaker 1: hit upon that gets overlooked is when you talk about
Speaker 1: Tuskegee and the Tuskegee Airmen, UM, you're talking about four
Speaker 1: hundred to five hundred ish pilots fighter pilots typically UM
Speaker 1: that are thought of as a Tuskegee airman. But there
Speaker 1: were so many more people that made up like this
Speaker 1: whole project, this whole movement basically UM that I think
Speaker 1: there was something like twelve housing, like people trained in
Speaker 1: aviation through the that that are really technically Tuskegee airmen.
Speaker 1: They they are considered um so and they get overlooked
Speaker 1: a lot because the fighter pilots get all the glory.
Speaker 1: But I mean these are all these people played a
Speaker 1: huge significant role in the whole thing. Yeah. So we
Speaker 1: mentioned uh at the onset the first African American general
Speaker 1: Benjamin O'Davis Sr. And that his son figured prominently. So
Speaker 1: that's Ben Jr. Uh, he comes in. He went to
Speaker 1: he followed in dad's footsteps. He went to West Point, where,
Speaker 1: you know, despite it was sort of like a Lord's
Speaker 1: of Discipline sort of seen there. Oh man, I forgot
Speaker 1: about that book. Yeah, man, that was good. Good movie. Um,
Speaker 1: I make brutal to watch, but a really good movie.
Speaker 1: But Davis basically went to West Point, didn't give him
Speaker 1: a roommate, made him eat by himself. Uh. They say
Speaker 1: that he was like literally not spoken to by anybody
Speaker 1: unless they absolutely had to speak to him. Yet he
Speaker 1: persevered through all this. He graduated and uh went to
Speaker 1: teach at Tuskegee instead of going to command for enlisted troops.
Speaker 1: So it was a bit of serendipity that he ended
Speaker 1: up there. I think kind of right. At the same time,
Speaker 1: this Air Corps began, which is really really kind of cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1: one of the first things he did was um as
Speaker 1: he was I think he became the commander of the
Speaker 1: ninety nine Pursuit Squadron. Um. He also was one of
Speaker 1: their first graduates. He was in the first class to
Speaker 1: graduate from flight school there. So, um, I don't know
Speaker 1: that he had much flight training prior to that, but
Speaker 1: he went and learned it. Became pretty distinguished as a
Speaker 1: pilot either way. But he he was immediately assigned the
Speaker 1: ninety pursuit squadron. He was in charge of it, which
Speaker 1: is pretty cool, right. So um as the as the
Speaker 1: um the Tuskegee Airman started to distinguish themselves, which we'll
Speaker 1: talk about more in a minute. Um Davis kind of
Speaker 1: became distinguished as well because he was leading the whole show. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you know, he he had been through West Point.
Speaker 1: He knew what the deal was. He was like, he
Speaker 1: knew that there was a lot more riding on this
Speaker 1: than just forming an air squadron. He was like, black
Speaker 1: people all around the country are looking at us, They're
Speaker 1: banking on our success. Um, we have to like we
Speaker 1: have to be better than the best, UM, and so
Speaker 1: he was really tough. He tough but fair, but he
Speaker 1: would not put up with with anything that took away
Speaker 1: from their ultimate goal, which was to be the best
Speaker 1: airman in the country, black or white. Um. Apparently there
Speaker 1: were black pilots who would wash out of the program
Speaker 1: that historians say, like, you know, if that was a
Speaker 1: white pilot, that he would have been allowed to keep going.
Speaker 1: Like that's how high the standard was that Davis set
Speaker 1: for the Tuskegee Airman, Right, Well, it wasn't just Davis,
Speaker 1: I think. I think they were saying like they were
Speaker 1: unfairly not given their wings, whereas a white pilot elsewhere
Speaker 1: in another base undergoing training wouldn't have washed out. So
Speaker 1: some of the pilots that that did wash out probably
Speaker 1: did because they were being held to unfair racist standards,
Speaker 1: not necessarily by Davis, but by some of the white
Speaker 1: commanders and trainers. You see what I'm saying. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: I saw where Davis was very quick to give someone
Speaker 1: the aust if they didn't think they were living up
Speaker 1: to their position. Yeah. So the upshot of that, though, Chuck,
Speaker 1: was that, UM, the people who graduated from this program
Speaker 1: at Tuskegee were really really good pilots. I mean really
Speaker 1: good pilots. They were just held to, whether fair or unfair,
Speaker 1: higher standards. They had to prove themselves more than say,
Speaker 1: their white counterparts at other bases, and so the ones
Speaker 1: who actually did manage graduate were just as good as
Speaker 1: it got. But what's said is for the people who
Speaker 1: washed out, they might not have washed out of some
Speaker 1: of the other programs, like if they had been white
Speaker 1: elsewhere in another program. Um. So that and of itself
Speaker 1: is kind of demoralizing. But what really getches when you
Speaker 1: step back and realize, like the the the men who
Speaker 1: were going through pilot training program were the face of
Speaker 1: black America, and so not only were they being watched
Speaker 1: by you know, um, by racists whites and supportive whites too,
Speaker 1: but but say from racist whites to just watch for
Speaker 1: them to fail. I think Henry L. Stimpson, who was
Speaker 1: the Secretary of War, said sure, we're going to give
Speaker 1: him a shot, but I expect nothing less than disaster
Speaker 1: to be produced by this. And I think he met
Speaker 1: like literal disaster, like planes crashing everywhere kind of thing.
Speaker 1: So not only did you have like that kind of
Speaker 1: observation going on you at all time. You also carried
Speaker 1: with you the hopes and dreams and expectations of Black America,
Speaker 1: and not just Black America something big, in amorphous and
Speaker 1: vague like that, but your family and your church group
Speaker 1: and your community back home. We're all like pulling for
Speaker 1: you but also really expecting everything from you. And if
Speaker 1: you graduated, that was huge, and if you washed out,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that was equally huge in the other direction. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So March uh two was when the first class of
Speaker 1: cadets graduated. Um, it would take another like four months
Speaker 1: or so five months to get enough pilots, you know,
Speaker 1: graduating through the program that they were a full fighter squadron.
Speaker 1: And the early results you know they were. There were
Speaker 1: very high ranking US officials that were pretty impressed early on,
Speaker 1: including that Secretary of War Stimpson that you you talked
Speaker 1: about that predicted disaster. Yeah, he had a change of heart. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he visited Tuskegee and said, the outfit looks as good
Speaker 1: as any I've ever seen. Major General James Julio said,
Speaker 1: from results so far obtained to believe that the squadron
Speaker 1: will give an excellent account of itself in combat. And
Speaker 1: that it would be a credit to its race and
Speaker 1: two Americans everywhere. Um. And despite this, it still took
Speaker 1: a long time to get the full confidence to actually
Speaker 1: send them into the theater of war in Europe. Well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I don't even know if it was confidence. I think, well,
Speaker 1: I guess it was confidence in a way. But there
Speaker 1: were other commanders of at the time they call them
Speaker 1: air forces, where it was like squadrons and groups just
Speaker 1: put together like a huge mass of of UM. Air
Speaker 1: Corps subdivisions were called air forces at the time, So
Speaker 1: if you were running the show in an air force,
Speaker 1: you'd be like, I don't want them, I don't want them.
Speaker 1: And all of them were saying I don't want them.
Speaker 1: They couldn't give them away, so they were just stuck
Speaker 1: in America, while um, the United States had already joined
Speaker 1: World War two and was all fighting in places like
Speaker 1: North Africa and the Mediterranean. Yeah, and I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is confirmed, but some say
Speaker 1: that Eleanor Roosevelt got in her husband's ear once again. Uh.
Speaker 1: And finally, in what April ninety three, they got their
Speaker 1: first orders thee to go to North Africa. Uh. In
Speaker 1: nineteen forty three, which was what is up like two
Speaker 1: years after the first graduated class. So you know the
Speaker 1: upshot to this though, is they're still training this whole time,
Speaker 1: right right, They're just getting better and better in training.
Speaker 1: But can you imagine like having to sit around and
Speaker 1: wait waiting for the order to get out there? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So UM, some of the first assignments they got when
Speaker 1: they were running sorties off of North Africa. Um, they
Speaker 1: were there was an island called Panatella, I believe into
Speaker 1: a knee cap Uh it's Pantalaria, Pantellaria. Wow, that was
Speaker 1: way off, Thank you for correct Yes, Um, Pantellaria was
Speaker 1: occupied by the Italian Army and they gave up. They
Speaker 1: surrendered the island without any ground forces having to land
Speaker 1: because the Tuskegee airmen were bombing them so bad. They
Speaker 1: were sent dive bombing campaigns. And that usually consists of
Speaker 1: attacking a ground position, whether it's like um, some sort
Speaker 1: of transport like transport planes and an airfield or rail
Speaker 1: cars or um, you know, gas or water, infrastructure, just
Speaker 1: stuff to make the enemy rather uncomfortable or unable to
Speaker 1: operate in this place that they've occupied. Um. And it
Speaker 1: very rarely, uh requires any kind of aerial dog fighting
Speaker 1: like we think of with fighter fighter pilots. It's more
Speaker 1: just attacking the enemy where they are rather than trying
Speaker 1: to battle for domination of the skies. That's what a
Speaker 1: dog fight is, It's what um fighter to fighter combat is.
Speaker 1: So this is different. So you're not gonna encounter other
Speaker 1: fighters typically, so you're not gonna have as many kills.
Speaker 1: They don't count like blowing up a set of rail
Speaker 1: cars as a kill, you have to shoot another fighter
Speaker 1: plane out of the sky, and that's what they really
Speaker 1: count when you're a fighter pilot it. But if you're
Speaker 1: not being assigned those kind of sorties, you're not gonna
Speaker 1: rack up kills like that. So everybody understood this. This
Speaker 1: was fine, But apparently somebody was talking to the press
Speaker 1: back in America and ended up getting a story out
Speaker 1: of Time magazine that questioned the ninety nine fighter squadrons
Speaker 1: bravery because they've been flying all sorts of authorities, But
Speaker 1: where were all their kills? All these other white pilots
Speaker 1: had all these kills, Where was the Tuskegee Airmen's kills?
Speaker 1: And the the context of that wasn't put into that
Speaker 1: that magazine. So what the rest of America read was
Speaker 1: the Tuskegee Airmen or cowards. And all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: Benjamin O'Davis Jr. Finds himself being called back to Washington
Speaker 1: to explain why his squadron are being called cowards in
Speaker 1: the national press. That's right, so let's pick that up
Speaker 1: right after this message, because things changed in January. All right,
Speaker 1: So the Tuskegee Airmen are over there, uh doing these
Speaker 1: um you know, they're dropping bombs. They did get a
Speaker 1: little bit of um fighter to fighter action, but not enough,
Speaker 1: you know, to toward the press off. Uh. This is
Speaker 1: despite the fact that they had virtually um you know,
Speaker 1: they were still segregated. You know. What they usually did
Speaker 1: was say, here, let's mix in these uh, these new
Speaker 1: guys with some experience guys, and they can sort of
Speaker 1: mentor them and help them out. Because it was segregated,
Speaker 1: they kept them separate. And yet they still persevered through
Speaker 1: all this. Uh. Like you said before the break, Davis
Speaker 1: comes home to the US to sort of battle these reports. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then things took a real change. In January. There
Speaker 1: was a uh patrol unit of twelve planes flying over
Speaker 1: on CEO and they spotted these German fighters. Um, just
Speaker 1: like like Maverick and Goose and Top Gun although they
Speaker 1: were just training, right battle and top Gun right, No,
Speaker 1: there wasn't a battle, but they did engage that MiG
Speaker 1: Remember he flew upside down and flipped him off and
Speaker 1: took a polaroid. So dumb. So we're doing a sequel
Speaker 1: to that, you know, like a sequel with Tom Cruise
Speaker 1: and really yeah, yeah, and it's exactly what you would think.
Speaker 1: It's Tom Cruise is now the veteran instructor and a
Speaker 1: and a young Maverick comes under his watch, and I
Speaker 1: don't even know, I'm not even sure, but it's I'm
Speaker 1: sure it's one of those deals where you know, Cruise
Speaker 1: gets to say, like I was you. Yeah, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: toss Christian Navarro's hat in the ring. How about that?
Speaker 1: I think they've already cast it, but uh, you never know.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe we've got some whole chuck and we're just influence. Yeah, Christian,
Speaker 1: if you're listening, we we're rooting for you, my friend. So, uh,
Speaker 1: they see these German fighters, these twelve planes, and they're like,
Speaker 1: let's go get them fellas. Uh, and they get into
Speaker 1: a dog fight, pretty legendary dog fight, and they record
Speaker 1: five kills in about four or five minutes, no losses,
Speaker 1: no losses. That's a big one too, Yeah, And it
Speaker 1: was a very big deal for the ninety nine after that.
Speaker 1: And this was like after these reports had come into
Speaker 1: the US. They weren't like they were fairly dejected, but
Speaker 1: that made him hungrier than ever. And this is why
Speaker 1: they sort of flung themselves headlong into this attack and
Speaker 1: they made the news and they became known all of
Speaker 1: a sudden as these pilots that would really go after
Speaker 1: the Germans. They have a high kill rate, and it
Speaker 1: was a big deal. Yeah. So there's two other things.
Speaker 1: So not only um were they were they not being
Speaker 1: assigned missions typically that would rack up high kill rates,
Speaker 1: so how can you criticize them for that? But secondly,
Speaker 1: when they were in North afric in their first assignment,
Speaker 1: they were given really old, really obsolete planes and they
Speaker 1: were um when they did engage German UH fighter pilots,
Speaker 1: they were out out classed as far as the planes
Speaker 1: are concerned. And they were still taking out Germans and
Speaker 1: dog fights, so like they had a lot going against
Speaker 1: them and still managed to prove themselves and then something
Speaker 1: really big change. They got transferred over to the UM
Speaker 1: I believe, the fifteen Air Force and the nine hundred
Speaker 1: first and the three hundred and second, the four Tuskegee
Speaker 1: UM fighter pilot squadrons were all brought together under the
Speaker 1: three hundred and thirty second Fighter Group under the command
Speaker 1: now of Benjamin O'Davis Jr. Is a colonel at this
Speaker 1: point yep who and then placed under the fifteen Air
Speaker 1: Force and the Benjamin O'Davis Jr. And the guy who
Speaker 1: headed up fifteen their force. They they had the same
Speaker 1: philosophy for the kinds of assignments that the Tuskegee Airmen
Speaker 1: would be carrying out from now on, which were bomber escorts,
Speaker 1: and it was don't leave the bomber squadron. Like when
Speaker 1: you're escorting bombers, that's the point. You don't you don't
Speaker 1: peel off and chase after any other jets that are
Speaker 1: like any German jets that are coming towards you. And
Speaker 1: there were German jets, but German fighter planes, UM, And
Speaker 1: you don't chase them away. You just stay with the bombers.
Speaker 1: That's your point. And UM that's another thing that's not
Speaker 1: like you're not going to rack up a ton of
Speaker 1: kills in that respect. Yeah, I'm sure it was tough, like,
Speaker 1: especially given their reputation, they wanted to go shoot down
Speaker 1: German planes and Davis was like, no, man, you gotta like, uh,
Speaker 1: you gotta be disciplined in these these bombers are under
Speaker 1: threat and you gotta stick with them and so um.
Speaker 1: As a result of this, they developed like a really
Speaker 1: great reputation for for safely escorting bombers to their destination.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're part of a bomber fleet, you're
Speaker 1: flying behind enemy lines to go bomb a city or
Speaker 1: an oil refinery or something like that. And the purpose
Speaker 1: of these planes is not to shoot other planes out
Speaker 1: of the sky. It's to drop bombs. So you need
Speaker 1: fighter jets to escort you, fighter planes to escort you
Speaker 1: to these drop sites, and um shoot away any other
Speaker 1: planes that are going to try to shoot you out
Speaker 1: of the sky. So it's pretty hairy, but it's also
Speaker 1: um like you're protecting the bombers. That's the point. So
Speaker 1: the reputation that they developed Chuck actually became legendary. There
Speaker 1: was a false, a false myth that generated around it.
Speaker 1: But one that even when you peel away the myth
Speaker 1: and look at reality, it's still pretty impressive. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: the other thing that helped too was in you know,
Speaker 1: we mentioned that they were flying um, I mean, they
Speaker 1: weren't obsolete planes, they were just not as good as
Speaker 1: what they were flying against. Uh. They finally get the
Speaker 1: fifth one Mustang and they were like, now we're talking dudes,
Speaker 1: like this is this is go time? Really cool airplane.
Speaker 1: One of my favorites of all time is that fifty
Speaker 1: one Mustang. That's the World War two fire plane that
Speaker 1: everybody thinks of. Yeah, I mean it's it's I want
Speaker 1: to use words here, I can't use on this show
Speaker 1: to describe it because I get so excited about it.
Speaker 1: But it's pretty sweet. So they now finally had and
Speaker 1: you did mention the jet, you know, the MEU the
Speaker 1: m E two six two from Germany was the first
Speaker 1: jet that used in combat like that. And if you
Speaker 1: look at this thing, it looks like I would rather
Speaker 1: have the Mustang. This thing looks dangerous to me. It
Speaker 1: may well have been. I don't know much about it. Oh,
Speaker 1: you mean to be like the pilot of it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it was just an early small jet like
Speaker 1: I can't. I don't know. It was probably pretty scary
Speaker 1: to fly, or maybe it was great. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm but the three thirty second Now with their P
Speaker 1: fifty ones, they start painting there. You know we mentioned
Speaker 1: the movie Red Tails. That can comes from what they
Speaker 1: did on their wing. They painted their the tail of
Speaker 1: their plane red and that they became known for that.
Speaker 1: It was very distinguishable from the air and there were
Speaker 1: a lot of bomber pilots who were like, we want
Speaker 1: these red Tales because these guys are awesome. And some
Speaker 1: of them didn't even know that they were black pilots.
Speaker 1: They just knew that they were Red Tails, right. And
Speaker 1: and again the Red Tails had developed a really good
Speaker 1: reputation for escorting bombers to their bomb sites. Um and
Speaker 1: what was their rank? What did they lose? Uh? I
Speaker 1: know that for many many years they said they never
Speaker 1: lost a bomber, which is not true. They didn't. One
Speaker 1: of the newspapers in Chicago, the Chicago Defender, published a
Speaker 1: story in that of more than two hundred bomber escort missions,
Speaker 1: the Tuskegee Airmen never lost a bomber. Today is in
Speaker 1: people not the airmen. But that was the that was
Speaker 1: the myth that developed that they never lost a bomber.
Speaker 1: That is basically impossible over something like two hundred missions. Um.
Speaker 1: But that's the myth that stood for um like fifty
Speaker 1: sixty years something like that. And then finally in a
Speaker 1: story and with the Air Force like actually dug in
Speaker 1: and did the shoe leather work on it and found, um, no,
Speaker 1: actually they did lose some bombers. They lost something like, uh,
Speaker 1: I think twenty six or twenty seven bombers, but out
Speaker 1: of like the two hundreds something missions, that is still
Speaker 1: a ridiculously small amount. And that other um squadrons and
Speaker 1: fighter groups in the fifteenth Air Force they average something
Speaker 1: like forty seven, so almost double what the Tuskegee Airman
Speaker 1: saw in losses. So they had paltry losses. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the idea that they just wouldn't have ever lost a
Speaker 1: bomber is it's it's impossible. You just couldn't not lose
Speaker 1: a bomber over that many missions. So you know, we
Speaker 1: all know how World War two ends. UM spoiler alert,
Speaker 1: the Allies. Uh, the Allies did their job, and so
Speaker 1: the Tuskegee Airmen start to get sent home like with
Speaker 1: other troops over the years. And here's the you know
Speaker 1: that the double V campaign. They were hoping they come
Speaker 1: home and they are more accepted, and they might even
Speaker 1: be revered, they might get good jobs, they might become
Speaker 1: commercial airline pilots. None of those things happened. Very sadly,
Speaker 1: that did not equate to equality back home, which is
Speaker 1: one of the troope like black eyes on this country's history.
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, um, some of them, I mean yeah,
Speaker 1: that was it should have just automatically triggered. Well, they
Speaker 1: shouldn't have This should have never happened in the first place, right,
Speaker 1: like dragging feet on segregation and making African America jump
Speaker 1: through these hoops like this, um, rather than just integrating,
Speaker 1: like making a segregated Air Air Corps squadron first and
Speaker 1: letting them prove themselves like that and then once they
Speaker 1: proved themselves still not opening doors or anything like that. Um.
Speaker 1: It that it should have never happened. But the fact
Speaker 1: that it didn't happen automatically is pretty pretty shameful. It
Speaker 1: did they It's not like they weren't successful. Though. They
Speaker 1: laid the groundwork and they laid the foundation, and they
Speaker 1: began the momentum for a lot of people, say the
Speaker 1: civil rights movement that, um, they they what they the
Speaker 1: groundwork that they laid, the way that they changed America's
Speaker 1: minds about black people in general, like oh, they actually
Speaker 1: can fly planes, and oh they can't shoot Germans out
Speaker 1: of the sky, and oh look at this, they can
Speaker 1: actually do better at bomber escorts than white counterparts. Right. Um,
Speaker 1: that change and mentality that they were able to take
Speaker 1: advantage of in this circumstance and history, that changed everything.
Speaker 1: So they were very much successful in that. It's just
Speaker 1: shameful that that they had to just keep fighting and
Speaker 1: keep pressing on that this was really just the first
Speaker 1: step rather than the last. Yeah, for sure, But I
Speaker 1: mean I think that wording is is perfect picked. It
Speaker 1: was the groundwork, absolutely, the foundation. Foundational groundwork was laid. Um.
Speaker 1: As for Colonel Davis, he uh after the war in
Speaker 1: ninety is when Truman ended segregation in the military. Uh.
Speaker 1: Colonel Davis advised on that integration and had a great career.
Speaker 1: He retired in nineteen seventy and in very cool was
Speaker 1: made an honorary General of the Air Force, four star general.
Speaker 1: So he'd made it to lieutenant general before he retired, UM,
Speaker 1: and I think a four star lieutenant general, and then
Speaker 1: Clinton advanced him to general, so he was a four
Speaker 1: star general of the Air Force after retirement. That's right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty great story. Yeah, it is a pretty great story.
Speaker 1: There was also something called the Freeman Field Mutiny, which
Speaker 1: is kind of happening in the off to the side
Speaker 1: the UM. The Tuskegee Airman also formed a bombardier group,
Speaker 1: a bomber group of bomber pilots that never saw any action,
Speaker 1: but saw a lot of races and segregation in back
Speaker 1: at home during training. And there was one event that's
Speaker 1: called the Freeman Field Mutiny where they basically protested segregated
Speaker 1: officers clubs, segregated and unequal officers clubs. And the way
Speaker 1: that they protested it um through basically civil disobedience, but
Speaker 1: in the military at a time when you could be
Speaker 1: executed for disobeying and direct order, which they were given. UM,
Speaker 1: they stood up for their civil rights. And that's another
Speaker 1: way that that another thing that's pointed to as laying
Speaker 1: the foundation for the civil rights movement, peaceful civil disobedience,
Speaker 1: and that actually came out of the Tuskegee Airman's story
Speaker 1: as well. Absolutely good stuff, good stuff. Check. This is
Speaker 1: a good idea to cover this one. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: this was long overdue. But uh, like I said, I
Speaker 1: don't think we had an article on the House of
Speaker 1: Fork site, so we just went out and had it
Speaker 1: commissioned on our own. Nice work. Uh. Well, let's see.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about the Tuskegee Airmen, apparently,
Speaker 1: go watch a couple of so so movies. There's some
Speaker 1: documentaries out there. One of them is called They Fought
Speaker 1: Two Wars, which is perfectly titled. Um. And there's also
Speaker 1: I think an American experiences a lot of stuff. Start reading,
Speaker 1: go to Tuskegee, Alabama. Do all that stuff? Okay, yes,
Speaker 1: And since I said do all that stuff, it is
Speaker 1: time for listener man, I'm gonna call this, uh the
Speaker 1: Tits Project. Hey, guys, just listen to the elephant episode.
Speaker 1: And Josh mentioned that typically groups of birds and deer
Speaker 1: don't actually know each other like elephants and recognize one
Speaker 1: from the other. However, I just read an article in
Speaker 1: a recent Audubon magazine. Um, I know, he said typically,
Speaker 1: but I wanted to point you towards this study that
Speaker 1: is really interesting, the with Them Tit project in Britain.
Speaker 1: It is a very long running study where they're looking
Speaker 1: at the relationships between tits in Britain and they have
Speaker 1: found that they run in social groups and appear to
Speaker 1: have friends. I highly recommend giving a read appearent when
Speaker 1: these guys must recognize each other. And I actually read it,
Speaker 1: and that's why I'm recommending it because it's a really
Speaker 1: great article. It's uh, it's called It's from Audubon Magazine,
Speaker 1: Audubon dot com or I'm sorry dot org the Surprising
Speaker 1: connection between Birds, Facebook and other social networks. Very cool article.
Speaker 1: So that is from Miranda and Duluth, Minnesota. Nice. You
Speaker 1: can go read that and have fun, fun, fun on
Speaker 1: the Audubon magazine until Daddy takes your laptop away. Weird.
Speaker 1: That was great, Chuck. I don't think we can improve
Speaker 1: on that. So we're just going to say, if you
Speaker 1: want to get in touch with us, you can um
Speaker 1: join us on all of our social media networks. UH,
Speaker 1: go to stuff you should know dot com. It's basically
Speaker 1: the clearinghouse for links to find us hanging out on
Speaker 1: the social meds. UH. And you can also send us
Speaker 1: an email, send it to stuff podcast at that's the
Speaker 1: AT symbol how stuff works dot com. For more on
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics, visit how stuff works
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