Jeremiah Franklin
Tuskegee Airman
Responses to Fate Cards
Fate 1
How do the white officers treat you? Is it better, worse or just different than your
experiences at home? Explain.Response
Response
The white officers at the Tuskegee Base are treating us very poorly. We are constantly
being called "ni--ers" and "buffalo soldiers." We have to bunk in
separate barracks and we even eat separately. This isn't much different from the way it
was back home, except there were a lot of black folks were I was from. And here, the white
folks are all over the place. We are constantly being yelled at and disrespected. The
other day I was walking to my flight training on the field, and a bunch of white cadets
tossed an egg from breakfast at me. I was going to start a fight, but my friends held me
back. Another instance was on the first day we got to the Air Base, Lieutenant Green
forced us to retake our pilots exam, because we all got A’s. He assumed we cheated.
So we took it again. And the second time, we got A’s again. Me and the rest of the
guys were rather insulted by this request. Just because we’re black, doesn’t
mean we are stupid. I’m getting the feeling that he and the rest of the white pilots
are trying to make us fail. Trying so we don’t make it as pilots. But this isn’t
anything new. We have always being treated like this. About everything. School, work,
food, everywhere. But it is my goal to become a pilot, and there is no white man that will
stand in the way of that. I will prove that I can be a pilot. You would think the United
States Air Force would have a greater respect for racial difference. Although I have
suffered the oppression of white folks my whole life, the way we are being treated here is
unlike anything I have endured in Nashville. Not only are we being mistreated, but we are
in a completely different world. It’s worse.
Fate 2
While you are stationed in Alabama your family is caught up in the race riots which erupt
in your home city (find out about these first). Write a letter home.
Response
Dear family, The other day I was reading the newspaper and I read about the race riots in
Detroit. I was shocked and concerned for your safety. The details of the article were
painful to read. I had heard, from others on the base, including the officers, about the
rioting. I read about how the white police officers are beating up the blacks, assuming
they started the rioting and the problems in the first place. My only advice would be to
stay out of the streets, and don’t sacrifice your lives rioting against the whites.
Fortunately, since we are restricted to the base, we are so far unaffected by the rioting.
I only hope that by my break everything will calm down and it will be safe for me to come
and visit you. Unfortunately, it looks like after my break the group of pilots which I fly
with will be heading overseas. It is an exciting time for me, it will be my first time
fighting in Europe. I feel like I’m making history, being one of the first black
pilots to fight overseas. I’m slightly scared, but more worried about the race
rioting and segregation. After all I’ve been trained to fly and fight, but not to
defend myself against whites and their hate. But, for now, I can only hope for your
safety, and be glad that I’ll see you soon. Love, Jeremiah
Fate 3
Easter Sunday is a quiet morning on the base; all of the officers are attending church
services. You and your fellow pilots, however, have been banned from attending. When you
tried to enter the chapel you were turned away by the MPs. What is your reaction? Where do
you go? What do you do?
Response
On Easter Sunday, everyone from the Tuskegee base went over to the church to worship God. However when we got there, the white Military Police were standing outside the doors, and told us we weren’t allowed in the church because of our race. They said only whites were allowed to pray to God today. We were so pissed off at them, because this is by far the most discriminatory act they had ever committed. As anyone who has ever been to war knows, praying is one of the most important things to a soldier; it is all he has to help him keep his sanity. So when we weren’t allowed to go to church on one of the most holy days of the year, we were infuriated. After trying our hardest to get in the doors, we finally gave up. We went back to our bunks, and sat in a circle reciting all the prayers we could remember. When we finished saying those prayers, we made up our own prayers for peace in the world, and for equality among all men. We all hoped that someday we would be treated the same as everybody else. And until that day, we will keep on fighting for the rights of all minorities.
Fate 4
The war is over. You return home from service in one of the most decorated units of the
armed services. What did you and your fellow pilots do to earn this honor? BONUS: How do
your accomplishments compare with other air units?
Response
When we returned home from the air force, we was greeted by a large group of blacks that
was cheering’ and clapping’. We got our own little parade through the city, and
we got to sit in a convertible at the front of it. We was waving’ and we
couldn’t help but smile. We had done a real good job in Tuskegee; we had tons of
decorations and medals to prove it. But when we heard about the parade and party that the
white pilots and soldiers got, we was shocked. They had lots of parades, and they had
parties that lasted all night long. Our parade was only about an hour or two. When we
asked them why, they told us that it was because we din’t have as many colored pilots
to be in our parade. But then we found out that they wan’t even planning to give us a
parade at all; this parade was planned entirely by the blacks in the city. Once we found
that out, we was real grateful to the people who planned the whole parade. We think we
really deserved this parade, because we had done what no black folks had ever done before.
We had actually flown planes in the army to help our country fight for freedom and the
rights of other innocent people. And we didn’t do just what we was supposed to do in
the army. We went way above and beyond the call duty to help our nation. We all flew
several extra missions more than we was supposed to, and we was treated much worse than
the whites. We flew missions that seemed impossible, missions that the white pilots would
never think of doing. And we flew them because we wanted to help out our country, not
because we was forced to. We is real proud of what we did when we was in the air force. I
think we did a better job than the white pilots stationed near us, and we helped inspire
blacks everywhere that they can do anything if they put their minds to it.
Fate 4A
The last home you knew was Nashville, TN. While you were away, your family, along with
many other southern blacks, migrated north. The only things you know about Detroit are the
race riots and the scant descriptions in the letters from your family. Where do you call
home? What will you do when you get there? What post-war obstacles do you face?
December 12, 2000 The war is finally over, and after years of fighting, I can return home. But my home is Nashville, Tennessee, the only place I had ever lived before Tuskegee. My family has moved to Detroit, a place I know very little about. All I know is what I heard about the race riots from the radio, and the letters from my family. But Dinah, my fiancé, still lives in Nashville. I don’t know how to choose where I am going to live. I can’t just give up my home in Nashville and never return. I can’t just move to a brand-new city, state and way of life after dreaming about returning to Nashville for all these years. Then again I can’t say good-bye to my family; the people who were always there for me and the people who raised me like I was their son. I just don’t know what to do. In the letters from my family, they tell me about the difficulties they have finding jobs there, and the bad conditions they have in the factories. Many of my cousins don’t have jobs, and are still looking for them. And things will be even worse if I go to live with them, because all of the other soldiers will return home to Detroit and take their jobs back. This will put a lot of people out of jobs, and will probably affect my family. Another problem that they will face are the closing of the munitions factories that make guns, bullets, planes, tanks, submarines and boats. These employ many people in factories, and will probably have a huge effect on the large cities. There will be a huge lack of jobs, and people will migrate out of the cities to find new jobs. They may be forced to move once again. The other option I have is to return home to the woman I love, Dinah. Before I left for the war, I promised to marry her when I returned. But I never planned on having to choose between her and my family. If I choose to live with her, I will be back in the town I grew up in, with the woman I love, starting a family. But I will never see my Aunt Jamayla, Uncle Jebb, or any of my cousins ever again. And I’ve already gone for such a long time without seeing them; I don’t know how I can do it. I had been thinking about this problem for a while, and discussing it with some of the other guys in my bunk. One of the guys had a great solution. He said to move back to Nashville, get married to Dinah, then buy back the farm we used to live on and invite my family to move back into it. I’m sure we’d get by, and I wouldn’t have to sacrifice anything. Life would be very close to the way it was before the war. I hope everything works out. I just need to convince my family to move back. I think they will do that, because there will be very few jobs in Detroit, and it will be very crowded when people start returning home from the war.
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