On 100th birthday, metro Detroit Tuskegee Airman reflects on changing racial attitude

On his 100th birthday, on the Fourth of July, a West Bloomfield Tuskegee Airman had a message about the racial progress he has witnessed over the past century: Guard it with vigilance.

U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Harry Stewart was among the approximately 1,000 first Black Air Force pilots trained at Tuskegee Army Air Field in Alabama during World War II, before racial integration of the military branch began in 1948.

He spoke surrounded by loved ones Thursday, on the heels of a birthday party at Coleman A. Young Municipal Airport thrown by the Tuskegee Airmen National Historical Museum and replete with accolades , vintage planes, and a flyover.

“Harry Stewart is one of the most decorated pilots in history," said museum director Brian Smith. "He continues to inspire generations of Detroiters to reach for the stars and achieve their dreams."

For Stewart, joining what was then known only as the 332nd Fighter Group as a pilot in 1941 was the fulfillment of a longtime dream.

He'd loved planes almost since birth. As a baby, he bounced up and down as they flew over his home in Newport News, Virginia, he said his parents told him. He remained captivated by aircraft as a boy in Queens, New York, after the family moved near the airport that would come to be known as LaGuardia.

“Planes made an impression on me from early childhood,” Stewart said. “I used to go and sit on the fence at the perimeter of the field there and watch the planes take off and fantasize I was the pilot,” adding some of the planes were military.

So by the time the U.S. entered WWII in 1941, Stewart said, he knew what he wanted to do in the service. And after a 1940 law — The Selective Training and Service Act — forced the War Department to accept Blacks in numerical proportion to whites, he became a pilot in one of the Air Force's first Black, segregated units.

Stewart’s 332nd was an Italy-based fighter unit escorting bombers to Germany and back. They broke records, including flying at least 170 bomber escort missions for the 15th Air Force without losing a bomber.

But when WWII ended in 1945, the men were not praised, as they are today, for having been the first Black flying fighting force. Instead, Stewart said, those who continued to serve in the Air Force had a “tough time” during the integration that followed. They were dispersed to bases around the world and left “on their own … outnumbered (by) those who still held onto the segregationist beliefs,” he said.

Stewart and his compatriots became known as the Tuskegee Airmen around the 1970s, he said, following the release of a book by another service member. Honor came only after Laurence Fishburne’s 1995 TV movie about the airmen, Stewart said. A Hollywood film, executive produced by George Lucas, followed in 2012.

Reflecting on his Thursday birthday party, which included a gift from Vice President Kamala Harris’ office, Stewart said he never expected the recognition he has received over the last 30 years of his life.

“I guess when I got out of the service, I felt I had done what I was supposed to do and that that was a period in my life.” He turned his focus elsewhere, getting an engineering degree at New York University and working in construction project management for major corporations before moving to metro Detroit in 1976 and eventually retiring as vice president of an oil and gas consortium.

But Stewart said he's enjoyed the “sudden” recognition of the Tuskegee Airmen, which he says has also given him the opportunity to speak to and inspire young people.

“It’s been quite nice and a lot feel it was overdue,” Stewart said.

The support reflects changing attitudes as they pertain to race, particularly in the military, that he has witnessed over the course of his life, he said. Stewart noted that Black men now lead the military, pointing to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Charles Quinton Brown Jr.

“The social system in the country today is considerably different than what I went through as a youngster,” he said.

“But segregation is not completely gone and we have to be very careful to exercise our rights to vote,” Stewart said, though declined to answer questions about his personal politics.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: On 100th birthday, metro Detroit Tuskegee Airman reflects on changing racial attitude