National Defense: 99th

Flying over a new airdrome near Alabama's famed Tuskegee Institute this week, U.S. Army Air Forces pilots looked down on something new in the world. The air field, still abuilding, looked like many another new Army training center. Four Stearman trainers buzzed on and off in an interminable series of landings and takeoffs, and cadets waited on the flying line for their turns to fly.

But pilots who landed and looked around found the scene not familiar at all. All twelve of the gray-clad cadets and the one slim young officer student were Negroes,...

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