Pittsburgh area's Tuskegee Airmen praise film's attention

Dr. Harry Lanauze's office in McKeesport office resembles a shrine to aviation.

A picture of a bomber hangs from the wall behind his desk, just a few feet from a slightly tattered copy of the private pilot's license, received in 1985.

The nose of a tiny model Cessna peers out from a bookcase across the room.

But it's the image in the waiting room, a P-51 fighter, that sparks the most memories.

Long before his life focused on stethoscopes and examining patients, Lanauze was at home in the cockpit of one of these powerful one-seater planes. He escorted bombers through hostile, smoke-filled skies over Germany during World War II.

"It was dangerous work, sure. But that was our job," says Lanauze, 85, a family-practice physician. "That was the way we felt about it."

Lanauze and other former Tuskegee Airmen have high hopes for George Lucas' big-screen epic "Red Tails," which hits theaters nationwide today. They want the slick, much-anticipated film to bring new, overdue attention to a moment in aviation history that many have forgotten.

"You have to remember: These were 18-, 19-, 20-year-olds going off to war," says Regis Bobonis, chairman of the Greater Pittsburgh Chapter of Tuskegee Airmen and the principal researcher on two projects to find former pilots in the area. "They did something that was courageous, while people were doubting them."

The all-black 332nd Fighter Group boasted one of the most successful bomber escort records in the military. Their reputation grew as they became the go-to group for guiding bombers to and from their destinations safely. There were 996 Tuskegee pilots in all, including roughly 70 from Pittsburgh and other parts of Western Pennsylvania.

For decades, the military was segregated and blacks were barred from flying for the U.S. military. That began to change in 1941 under pressure from civil rights groups and the black press, resulting in the formation of the all-black pursuit squadron. A dusty spit of land near the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama would serve as their training ground.

"I knew there was the possibility of going to Tuskegee," says Lanauze, who grew up in Washington, D.C., and was drafted into the Army in December 1943. "To me, that was much better than being a private in the army."

From Tuskegee, he was sent to Ramitelli Air Force Base in Italy, where the 332nd was stationed, and trained to be a navigator for a B-25 bomber. As casualties mounted, more fighter pilots were needed, and Lanauze ultimately was taught to fly the P-51.

"When they told me about (the opportunity), I said 'heck yeah, I'll do it,'" Lanauze says. "That's what I wanted to do all along."

Mitch Higginbotham, 90, was one of eight pilots from Sewickley. He grew up just blocks from the local YMCA, where he was barred from swimming in the pool because he was black. And, despite his tall, athletic frame, discrimination kept him from playing on his high school basketball team.

Before showing up to Tuskegee, Higginbotham got his first taste of the air at a small flying school near Latrobe. Three of its instructors -- including George Allen, the chief instructor -- were black. Abram Jackson, one of the black instructors, took Higginbotham up on his first flight, in a lightweight Piper Cub.

The ride lasted just 30 minutes.

"It was a thrill to look down on everything," says Higginbotham, who lives near Dana Point, Calif. "All the farms, the buildings, the cars. They looked liked like little ants."

Higginbotham passed an aviation cadet exam after he registered for the draft in 1941. He was reunited at Tuskegee with Jackson, who with Allen had been hired by the Army to teach other blacks to fly.

"We weren't thinking about making history at the time," Higginbotham says. "We just wanted to fly."

More minorities certainly fly in the military ranks today, but the percentage of black aviators in the Navy and Air Force -- the branches that use a majority of the military's fixed-wing aircraft -- remains very low.

Navy statistics show that just 336 of its 10,390 pilots, or 2.7 percent of them, are black. Just 244 of the 13,010 pilots in the Air Force are black.

And while pilots with military experience typically are shoo-ins for jobs with commercial airlines these days, that was not the case when Higginbotham and Lanauze flew. Airline companies weren't ready to let blacks into the cockpit, despite the Tuskegee Airmen's celebrated records.

"Here I got all these free flying lessons from the government ... yet I wasn't able to fly (for a living) in the U.S. because of discrimination," Lanauze says. "There may have been jobs out there, but there were none for me."

Lanauze and Higginbotham each ended their military careers as second lieutenants.

They and other Tuskegee pilots went back to school after the war, taking advantage of the G.I. Bill, which helped pay for veterans' education.

As a unit, the Tuskegee Airmen collectively flew more than 1,500 missions from 1943 to 1945. No one knows exactly how many of the pilots are still alive. Tuskegee Airmen Inc. ( www.tuskegeeairmen.org ), a national nonprofit that tries to preserve the pilots' legacy, tracks only its members and the pilots it has become aware of over the years.

Tuskegee Airmen service record

Tuskegee Airmen Inc. ( www.tuskegeeairmen.org ), a national nonprofit, maintains and shares information about the airmen.

A total of 2,483 pilot trainees participated in what was officially known as the "Tuskegee Experience," at Tuskegee Army Air Field from July 19, 1941, to June 28, 1946. In all, 996 pilots graduated from the program at Tuskegee AAF.

• 928 were Americans

• 5 were Haitians

• 1 was Trinidadian

• 11 were instructor pilots

• 51 were "Liaison" pilots

In all, 352 of the Tuskegee graduates were deployed overseas to Europe for combat duty.

• 84 Tuskegee Airmen were killed overseas during World War II.

During WWII, the Tuskegee Airmen flew:

• 1,267 missions and 6,381 combat sorties with the 12th Air Force from June 1943 to May 1944

• 311 missions and 9,152 combat sorties with the 15th Air Force from June 1944 to May 1945

The 332nd Fighter Wing was deactivated on June 1, 1949, roughly a year after President Harry Truman signed an order desegregating the Armed Forces.

The airmen were credited with 112 aerial kills.

No Tuskegee airman ever achieved "Ace" status, which required five or more kills. But Capts. Joseph D. Elsberry and Edward L. Toppins and 1st Lt. Lee A. Archer each shot down four enemy planes.

The Tuskegee Airmen collectively were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal by President George W. Bush and Congress on March 29, 2007.

Source: Tuskegee Airmen Inc.

Additional Information:

Local memorial

Construction of a memorial to honor Tuskegee Airmen from Western Pennsylvania is set to get under way soon in Sewickley Cemetery.

A groundbreaking ceremony for the monument took place last year, and construction is expected to begin in earnest on March 7. That day is the 72nd anniversary of the first graduation of pilots from the training program in Tuskegee. Five pilots were in the first graduating class.

The memorial will be etched with the names of more than 80 Western Pennsylvania servicemen. It is expected to be completed within three months. For more information or to donate, log on to the website .