
During World War II, Della Raney became the first Black nurse to enter the Army Nurse Corps since World War I. (Wikimedia Commons)
In 1940, under growing social and political pressure, President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized the enlistment of Black aviators in the Army Air Corps. From 1941 until 1946, about 1,000 men were trained as Tuskegee pilots and 16,000 graduated as ground crew. While an impressive number for the time and circumstances, there were also many others at the Tuskegee Army Air Field (TAAF) training, teaching, learning and working to defeat fascism overseas.
When the Army Air Corps launched a pathway for Black men to serve in the air, it did so through a separate, segregated support infrastructure, which included separate, segregated health care. Only Black medical staff could treat Black service members and civilians, and that created quite a problem: There simply weren’t any Black nurses in the Army. Continue reading