Veterans Day was celebrated in a special way at the National Warplane Museum in Geneseo on Friday.
Members of a distinguished group of aviators from World War II were honored, the Tuskegee Airmen, the first African-American military aviators in the U.S. Armed Forces. The pilots and their support crews were segregated into a separate unit in the Army Air Corps.
Two living Tuskegee Airmen received Congressional Gold Medals in Geneseo, three others were honored posthumously. Congressman Chris Collins was there to help award the medals.
One of the airmen who spoke, Wallace Higgins, just turned 91 on Veterans Day. He grew up in Kendall, and says he really didn’t learn about the kind of discrimination he would later face when he left Orleans County.
“I just can’t believe there’s a separation in human nature, and that really was a surprise to me . But I was pretty much home by myself, my brother had gone in the service, but you learn fast under the circumstances.”
Another man honored at the ceremony, Herbert Thorpe, is glad that Tuskegee Airmen have been honored in recent years, but he’s 93 and he says many of his fellow servicemen have passed on.
“We’re losing them also, we just lost two within the last couple of weeks; people that are still here and remembering us are giving us the opportunity to be recognized, I think is wonderful.”
Thorpe also accepted a medal on behalf of his brother Richard, who died during World War Two in a plane crash in Europe.
Michael Joseph is an historian for an association of Tuskegee Airmen. He noted that right after the war, the accomplishments of the airmen were not always recognized.
“...and their children and grandchildren came home sometimes crying being told by their teachers that your dad could never have served in that capacity, because it’s not in any of the history books."
Joseph says that’s why it’s important to pass on the heritage and the legacy of the Tuskegee Airmen.
