Titolo: "Tuskegee aviatori Smith e marrone, Ramitelli, Italia' mostra da sinistra a destra, Marcello G. Smith, Louisville, Kentucky, e Roscoe C. Brown, New York, NY Classe 44-C. P-SC#11, "Tootsie,' in background è stato assegnato a Lowell Steward. Il Airme Tuskegee
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Entitled: "Tuskegee airmen Smith and Brown, Ramitelli, Italy" shows left to right, Marcellus G. Smith, Louisville, Kentucky, and Roscoe C. Brown, New York, NY Class 44-C. P-SC#11, "Tootsie, " in background was assigned to Lowell Steward. The Tuskegee Airmen were the first African-American military aviators in the United States Armed Forces. During WWII, Black Americans in many U.S. states were still subject to the Jim Crow laws and the American military was racially segregated, as was much of the federal government. The Tuskegee Airmen were subjected to racial discrimination, both within and outside the army. The 332nd Fighter Group operated with the Fifteenth Air Force from May 1944 to April 1945, being engaged primarily in protecting bombers that struck such objectives as oil refineries, factories, airfields, and marshaling yards in Italy, France, Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Rumania, Bulgaria, and Greece. They also made successful strafing attacks on airdromes, railroads, highways, bridges, river traffic, troop concentrations, radar facilities, power stations, and other targets. The unit received a Distinguished Unit Citation for a mission on March 24, 1945 when the group escorted B-17s during a raid on the Daimler-Benz tank factory at Berlin, fought the Messerschmitt Me 262 jet interceptors that attacked the formation, and strafed transportation facilities while flying back to the base in Italy. Photographed by Toni Frissell March 1945.
