Red Tails and Black Aces: As a result of the "Tuskegee Experiment" being a proven success and used as a basis to demonstrate that Blacks could perform with excellence and in air combat and leadership roles, President Harry Truman, in 1948, signed the executive order to integrate the entire military.
The mere decision to go to war for their country, a country that deprived them of basic human rights, proves even further the competence and unheralded character of some of the greatest men in American history. The pilots of the 99th and the 332nd were named “The Red-Tailed Angels” by the bomber crews they protected. They are all “aces” because of their historic military role; they are Black by virtue of their heritage. Therefore, the 10,000 men and women of the “Tuskegee Experiment” are “Red Tails and Black Aces.”
TBJ #605 -- America’s Black Eagles – Part 1: Clipped Wings: Can Blacks fly airplanes and fight? The answer to this odious question would come from the creation of the only all-Black air force ever established by the U.S. military. This segment reviews this dark period in racial relations and the Black community's response to a segregated "separate but equal" policy of the Army Air Corps.
TBJ #606 – America’s Black Eagles – Part 2: The Enemy Within: Criticism of the 99th's overseas combat record was instantaneous and virulent. After only a few months in combat, the Commander of the 12th Air Support Command assailed the performance of the Black pilots. "Officers of all professions,” he said, felt that "the Negro type has not the proper reflexes to make a first-class fighter pilot.” Time magazine questioned the 99th's performance and asked: "Experiment Proved?" After a stateside controversy and a Senate hearing, the experiment was given additional time - but on a larger scale. The all-Black 332nd Fighter Group was also sent overseas for combat. The pressure to succeed had become enormous and the implication was very obvious: The performance of the 99th and the 332nd in combat would determine the future role of Blacks in the military. "The Enemy Within" was still there.
TBJ #607 – America’s Black Eagles – Part 3: Jim Crow’s Graveyard: Shooting down German airplanes, rather than effectively carrying out the assigned duties of close ground support and bomber escort, emerged as the criterion for the judgment of combat performance for the 99th. Ironically, at the height of the controversy stateside, the 99th received a reassignment of duties. The subsequent result: "Jim Crow's Graveyard.” Because of the reassignment, the 99th was flying more missions and coming into greater contact with the enemy. By early December, two months after joining the 79th, and during a period that overlapped the Senate hearings, the 99th had started flying 36 to 48 sorties a day. On November 30th, the 99th flew 26 missions for a new record.
Tony Brown’s Journal, “the most complete and thoughtful record of African-American opinion,” is in the process of offering one of the most cutting-edge educational tools for streaming to educators, homeschoolers, students, and parents. The entire digitally re-mastered TonyBrownsJournal.com expanded collection of nearly 1,000 historical, health, and public affairs video and film content that was produced by award-winning journalist Tony Brown on national television for over 40 years (1968-2008) is now being offered in this rare cutting-edge educationally purposeful opportunity for as little as $9.99 per year.
HISTORICALLY, TONY BROWN IS also …
- Coordinator of the “Walk To Freedom with Martin Luther King, Jr.” in Detroit (1963), according to the July 29, 1963 edition of Business Week magazine, “the largest civil rights march in history.”
- WINNER of the prestigious Silver Circle Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences
- Dean Emeritus and Professor, Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications, Hampton University
- First and Founding Dean and Professor, School of Communications, Howard University
- Founder, BLACK COLLEGE DAY, 1980
- 2015-2016 National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame Inductee
- Black Emmy Nominee – 1989 Special Recognition Award Winner
- Distinguished Visiting Professor, Honorary Degree – American University, Paris, France
- Distinguished Visiting Professor, Central Washington University, Ellensburg, WA
- Talker’s, Radio Trade Magazine: Selected as “One Of The 100 Most Important Radio Talk Show Hosts In America”
- “Tony Brown Chicago,” WLS-AM Radio (Chicago)
- “Tony Brown,” WLIB-AM Radio (New York) “Tony Brown at Daybreak,” WRC-TV (Washington, DC)
- “Tony Brown’s Journal”/“Black Journal” (TV series: 1968-2008): “The Most Complete and Thoughtful Record of African-American Opinion.”
- U. S. Army 272 field artillery (s-1 Intelligence) battalion and cadre (1953-1955). Neu-Ülm, GERMANY. Honorable discharge.
BLACK HISTORY
- Great Events In African-American History
- Tony Brown Donates $100,000 to Hampton University Scholarship Fund and sows the seeds of success for future journalists www.TonyBrownsJournal.com/blog/Tony-Brown-Donates-100k
- Tony Brown with Hampton University Journalism Students Make History At The New York Times Harvard, Columbia, Syracuse Place Second In Competition www.TonyBrownsJournal.com/blog/Tony-Brown-With-HU-Makes-history
HAS THE BLACK LEADERSHIP BETRAYED ITS OWN COMMUNITY?
WE STOOD WITH MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
“I was there 50 years ago, in 1963, one of the last two Directors left standing, where 500,000 marchers once stood.” --Tony Brown
“LARGEST CIVIL RIGHTS MARCH IN HISTORY”
The following week, in its July 29, 1963 edition, Business Week magazine called the Detroit event the “largest civil rights march in history.” Subsequently, an official police source, in an affidavit, confirmed an attendance of “no fewer than 250,000 and as many as 500,000 people.” Black people came mostly from throughout the nearby Midwest region.
More official confirmation has been forthcoming since then. Nearly 40 years later, in 2003, The Wall Street Journal would report on page one that the famed King Dream Speech may have had its roots -- not at the March on Washington (which drew 250,000), on August 28, 1963, but elsewhere, perhaps 66 days before in Detroit, Michigan where the attendance may have reached, according to an official police affidavit, 500,000 people.
Although I had no official role in the Washington March, I did witness it as a Detroit correspondent for the national Pittsburgh Courier newspaper chain of African-American local publications throughout the United States, an affiliate of the Black Press, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial within a few feet of Dr. King and I was included in Life magazine’s limited photo coverage of this historic event.
All of this in only 66 days! My head was spinning with excitement and wonderment. It seemed that my Detroit decision to choose activism as a way of life had become my destiny.
2013 – 50th Anniversary “Walk to Freedom March” – Detroit, MI
Tony Brown (center) Grand Marshal of the 2nd and final Detroit March on June 22, 2013, drew 200,000, with his grandson Remy Harris (left) and Jesse Jackson (right).
Free streamed copy of “THE WHITE GIRL" movie with each annual subscription is a streamed copy of “The White Girl,” a full-length anti-drug feature movie directed by Tony Brown that was released via commercial syndication in movie theaters in 1995 with a PG-13 rating. The opening inaugural debut of “The White Girl” at the Liberty Theatre in Hamilton, Bermuda (Bahamas) broke the house box-office gross record, according to Hollywood Reporter, a trade magazine.
BLACK COLLEGE DAY BILL- White House cabinet members and advocates of equal education look on as President Reagan signs Executive Order 12320, just one year after the first historic Black College Day rally in Washington, DC, that increased the amount of federal funds to these institutions by $9.6 million. From left to right are: Education Secretary Terrell Bell, Tony Brown, Founder and Chief Coordinator of Black College Day, Thelma Duggan, Coordinator of Minority Affairs at the Department of Transportation; and Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Dole.
LEADERS OF THE BLACK COLLEGE DAY MARCH IN 1980; THE ULTIMATE UNITY RALLY. Supporters of Black colleges from around the country demonstrated to save Black colleges from new federal and state desegregation plans that threatened their historic role. This 1983 Black College Day massive march and rally in Savannah, Georgia, protested the merger plans of two Black colleges in Georgia.
