Aviation Book Reviews
THE TUSKEGEE AIRMAN, by Lynn M. Homex & Thomas Reilly. Arcadia Publishing Co.

     This is a book of 128 pages arranged in 8 chapters. There are only 5 pages of text found in the acknowledgments and introduction. The rest of the book consists of photos and their captions. Many of the photos are new to me, although I've seen several of them in other books on the same subject.

     On page 59 (top), there's a photo of some P-47s taking off, but the caption was about P-40 Warhawks, which was first used in combat by the 99th Fighter Squadron. The 332nd Fighter Group was the only group in E.T.O. to fly four different fighter designs operationally in combat: the Curtiss P-40, the Bell P-39; the Republic P-47, and the North American P-51.

     On the top of page 69, there's a photo of a B-25 coming off an attack run on a freighter. But, the caption covered an impromptu attack on a German DE (destroyer escort) while returning from an uneventful escort mission that culminated in the sinking of the ship in June 1944. No B-25's were involved.

     On page 83, the photo of the American Red Cross girl is reversed. The Red Cross shoulder patch gives it away.

     A big plus for this book is that it continues beyond the original Tuskegee Airmen, all the way into the astronauts of today.  I wish there was more on the color schemes and specific markings of the 332nd Fighter Group and the 477 Light Bomb Group, as well as other aircraft from other conflicts.
 

- William J. Bennett
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