HomageUSA

HOMAGEUSA SPOLIGHTS MEMORIAL DAY FALLEN 66 PROJECT

My favorite Tuskegee Airman was Wilmeth Sidat-Singh who was expelled from Syracuse University for being Black (they assumed he was Indian because his father died when he was a baby and his mother got married to an Indian doctor who adoped Wilmeth. He drowned at the age of 25 after getting tangled in his parachute.

After the halo effect of the George Lucas film “Red Tails” and the DVD release, May 22nd, we’ll still be left with questions about the who, what, where and how of the real life Red Tail Angels. Some of the answers are buried in cemeteries in eruope and it’s the quest of Homageusa to unearth historical facts about a group men who we’ve coined as the Fallen 66. Their short lives and death will be research and celebrated to errect a virtual memorial in their honor.

With the premiere of George Lucas’s new movie Red Tails, there’s a renewed interest in the Tuskegee Airmen who trained in Alabama.

“We aspired to be pilots, nurses, mechanics—whatever—anything that would prove our merit amongst the fighting forces for this country,” –Nancy Leftenant-Colon. When speaking to Nancy Leftenant-Colon, the hope in her voice is undeniable. The strength she imparts upon her words is infectious, and her overall optimism is humbling. As an ambitious woman of character, she has a message to spread and a story to tell; a story she has lived and breathed with courage, service, and integrity. It is a story she hopes will inspire a generation into action.

When she retired in 1991 from the Tuskegee Airmen Organization, after having served as the organization’s first female President, Nancy’s sister teased her by saying, “Now maybe you can talk about something other than the Tuskegee Airmen.” In retrospect, it was an impossible suggestion. Nancy had been proudly immersed in the Tuskegee Experience for the past fifty years, and the legacy she had gained had left an indelible mark on her entire life.

The unveiling of the Fallen 66 focuses on a tale of two souls inextricably linked by the U.S Army Air Corps during World War II. Nancy would have gladly taken her brother’s place, Second Lieutenant Samuel Gordon Leftenant place as one of the Tuskegee Airmen Fallen 66. Nancy was born to be a soldier, she had great a model in her big brother Sam, who was a pilot in 99th Squadron USAAF, a Tuskegee Airmen who sought to fly P-51 Mustangs in europe during World War II, a true pioneer and heroes if there ever was. Nancy’s was a pioneer too, as she was the first in African American women to join the U.S. Army Nurse corps, three years after Samwas killed in action over Austria, April 12, 1945.

The main obstacle standing in her way though was that black nurses were not permitted to sign up for the Armed Forces. In 1944, Nancy went to visit her brother Sam at the Tuskegee Army Airfield in Alabama to gain his perspective on the problem. While there, she spoke to several members of the nursing staff and toured the airfield hospital. Afterwards, her brother asked her if a career in military nursing was really what she wanted. Nancy was absolutely certain. Her brother Sam’s advice to her was this: “Always remember the things mom and dad taught us.” It was a simple way of telling Nancy she could do anything she put her mind to; her parents had already given her the tools to succeed.

By January of 1945, Nancy was growing impatient to enter the war effort. Once she received her nursing certification from the state of New York, she marched into an Army recruiter’s office, slapped her diploma down on his desk, and told the recruiter she wanted to be an Army nurse. Nancy refused to take no for an answer, and the Army relented—allowing her to sign up as a reservist due to a shortage of white nurses. Despite this discriminatory technicality, Nancy was thrilled to have the opportunity to prove herself. She then traveled to Cape McCoy, Wisconsin to endure six weeks of grueling basic training. By mid-March, her hard work had paid off: Nancy became one of the first black nurses accepted into the Army Reserve Corps.

There’s very little written about Sam online, but with Nancy’s help we’ll augment the information herein. What we know is that Sam was one of six members of the Leftenant family who served in the military. Sam went missing in action after his plane was involved in an accident over Germany. A year later, he was declared dead. Like the other Tuskegee Airmen, Nancy’s brother had entered the military to fight injustice—not just the injustice present overseas, but also the racial injustice he faced at home. Though greatly saddened by his death, the spirit of her brother’s cause only strengthened Nancy’s resolve to be the best she possibly could be at everything she did. With the blessings of Nancy’s family we will paint a portrait of a man and his quest to serve his country at a time when African Americans had no civil rights, but had a lust for defending a country that didn’t recognize his as equal or entitled. Sam could have been just about anything he wanted, and arguably could have berm considered one of the talented tenth, yet je still put his life on the line for “God and Country”.

Hidden Heroes: African-American Women in WWII
Get More: Hidden Heroes: African-American Women in WWII

With the help of Nancy and the surviving the 200 plus documented original Tuskegee Airmen we plans to resurrect his memory and give you first hand accounts of interactions with Sam, the first of the Fallen 66 we plan to honor on Memorial Day, 2012.His remains and plane were never found, and his only tangible resting place is designated as the Tablets of the Missing at the Florence American Cemetery and Memorial in Italy. According to a government database, he was awarded an Air Medal and a Purple Heart for his military service.

The Fallen 66 project is a Facebook for the fallen, that will enable all who have given all to be remembered with updated content (testimonies) and a final opportunity to eulogize, celebrate and burry their fallen with the love befitting a men who did so much with so little (recognition), and still even today remain obscure even to their comrades. The question of how the Fallen 66’s lives and deaths effected their families and fellow Tuskegee Airmen “Red Tail” Angels will be examined and published in public forums that will make sure that they are not forgotten and lost for the permanent record.One of the Fallen 66 was 2nd Lieutenant Mac Ross, of Dayton, Ohio. Mac was in the first graduating class, and was one of the 1st five pilots to get their wings at Tuskegee, AL. (Mac Ross is on the left sitting in the front row in front of Colonel Davis)Maj. James A. Ellison returns the salute of 2nd Lieutenant Mac Ross, as he passes down the line during review of the first class of Tuskegee cadets; flight line at U.S. Army Air Corps basic and advanced flying school, Tuskegee, Alabama, 1941.