St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1945-06-01

euISu anu SuuCdISu uLSu WIN LAS1hC
up the Army Air Base at Tuskegee
will never do so. They will not
profit by the lesson that the Tus-
kegee Air Base could teach. They
will hold tenaciously to the Gus
tom and practice of separation of
the races on the ground that the
Negro is something different and
cannot be integrated into the warp
and wool of American life.
That one big justification for
the existence of this separate, Ne
gro training center is destroyed by
the fact that its lesson will not
reach those who need to learn it.
But what a lesson there is!
l was flown to the Air Base by
a pilot who had been trained at
Tuskegee. We rode in a BIS
bomber from Washington to the
base in 8 hours and Is minutes. l
sat beside him in the co-pilot's seat
and had the opportunity to observe
his handling of that powerhouse
in the air. He did it with the skill
and poise that my daughter shows
in riding her bicycle. The 122 dials,
keys, and instruments on the panel
and surrounding his seat were as
simple and clear to him as the
ABC's are to me. He lifted the
plane into the air with the ease
that would pick up a book. He
sat it down in a night landing at
Tuskegee as lightly and smoothly
as a mother would tuck her weeks
old babe into the crib.
Coming back, another pilot, fly
ing a routine cross country flight
in another BIS gave me not a
moments anxiety. Over Georgia's
red clay, over mountains draped in
broccoli-looking trees, over cities
that looked like models in a toy
electric-train set, we zoomed along
1000 feet overhead at 220 miles an
hour. General Doolittle could not
have performed the job more safe
ly nor more smoothly.
But the flying was not the main
point of interest in my experience.
Meeting the men who make up the
official staff and the pilots was
even more enlightening. Actually,
at Tuskegee Army Air Field are
the top-notch young men of Ne
gro-America. They are alert, COM
petent, skillful young men. Their
being in this one place accentuates
the high caliber of the group. But
the value of this segregation as
lesson to those who need it is lost.
1t serves, instead, to embitter many
of the fellows. No tendency is
shown to integrate Negroes into
the Army Air Forces as their mer-
it justifes.
1t may be true that we would not
have had the goth Pursuit. Squad
ron had it not been for the sepa-
rate training center at Tuskegee.
Nor would we have had the 332nd
Fighter Group, nor the 477th Bonn
bardment Group. We would not
have had hundreds of our boys
trained in aviation as pilots, me-
chanics, photographers, supply Of
ficers, etc. Their outstanding per-
formances may have been hidden
from view had they been scattered
throughout the Air Forces.
We have those things now, how
ever. And they have proved beyond
any doubt that the Negro can mas
ter the intricate secrets of flying
and maintaining planes. There is
no longer any justification for those
who said 1--WE must experiment" in
a manner to give the Negro a
chance to prove he can do it; nor
for those who say 1--WE must take
what we can get in order to make
an entering wedge" Both the ex-
pertinent and the entrance have
been made. And both have been a
star-studded success.
The Tuskegee Army Air Base is
a beautiful thing to ''look back
UPON" IT'S time now for US to look
forward.