It felt like a dagger to my heart when I read the headline stating that the US Air Force was removing the Tuskegee Airmen from training videos, to comply with the new President's orders. The idea that anyone could be so unpatriotic and so petty boggled my mind. The directive against DEI also prohibited showing videos of the women aviators that helped win WWII.
I didn't remain stumped for long. My mind immediately flew to the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site where the aviators trained, which includes the airfield, original artifacts such as the logbook in which my husband Frank found the name he was looking for - a Major in the Air Force who became his first employer, and a reconstructed flight simulator they used to train. We can almost relive their experiences, hear from them in their own words, and be inspired by the courage they showed as we address today's challenges.
The National Park System which protects this National Historic Site, similarly protects the places that were instrumental in the development of women aviators who helped win World War 11, including the
Curtiss-Wright Aeronautical Building in Chicago from which aviator Willa Brown graduated as the first African American woman to earn her pilot's license; the birthplace of Amelia Earhart and
Pearson Field at Fort Vancouver National Historic Site, where Lea Hing became the first Chinese-American woman to earn her pilot's license.
This is the value of the National Park System. Administrations come and go, but once a place of unique "natural, cultural or historical" significance goes through the intense vetting process required for inclusion in the System, it can be considered relatively safe. (The current President removed land from the System in his first term, the only leader we've known to do so.)
Imagine looking out at Moton Field where the Tuskegee Airmen learned to fly. The information you absorb at the park allows you to go back in time and put yourself in their shoes.
The irony of the US Air Force playing enforcer AGAINST the Tuskegee Airmen in the year 2025 can be gleaned from knowing that it was the Army Air Corps that conducted the tests in 1941 that led to the first African American Aviators being trained and ready for combat.
Imagine watching the video "Tuskegee Airmen: Sacrifice and Triumph" in the place where their experiences happened in real life. According to the National Park Service:
"As the centerpiece attraction at Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site in Tuskegee, Alabama, this film recounts the story of the first African American military aviators in the U.S. Armed Forces. Surviving Tuskegee Airmen recount their struggle for victory over the enemy abroad and over racism and discrimination at home. Their story unfolds in an immersive three-screen format featuring rare WWII-era archival footage, contemporary 3D animation, and reenactments filmed in 4K with authentic period aircraft.
"The Airmen were not just pilots. They were technicians, radio operators, medical personnel, quartermasters, parachute riggers, mechanics, bombardiers, navigators, meteorologists, control tower operators, dispatchers, cooks, and others. Also included were Caucasian officers, Native Americans, Caribbean islanders, Latinos, and people of mixed racial heritage.
"Almost 1,000 aviators were produced as America's first African American military pilots. In addition, more than 10,000 military and civilian African American men and women served in a variety of support roles.
"The women of the 'Tuskegee Experience' worked alongside male counterparts as mechanics, gate guards, control tower operators, aircraft fuselage technicians, secretaries, and clerks. There were three permanent female parachute riggers who were responsible for training hundreds of cadets in the correct procedures for packing and maintaining parachutes. Gertrude Anderson served as assistant to G.L. Washington at Kennedy Field where Tuskegee's Civilian Pilot Training Program was based. She assumed responsibility for continued operation of the airfield when Washington was transferred to Tuskegee Army Air Field.
The Tuskegee Airmen not only strove for equal rights under the law, but also through nonviolent direct action aimed at segregation in the military. "The members of the 477th Bombardment Group, staged a nonviolent demonstration to desegregate the officers' club at Freeman Field, Indiana, for example, helped set the pattern for direct action protests popularized by civil rights activists in later decades."
In the face of opposition, the Air Force has withdrawn that noxious order. I hope we learn from this what strategies and methods we must use to counteract the disgusting efforts to rewrite American history and erase the truth.
(Audrey Peterman is an environmentalist, author and advocate for integrating the National Park System since 1995.)