Tuskegee Airmen invited to inauguration
Posted: Thu Dec 11, 2008 9:47 pm
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Tuskegee Airmen invited to inauguration
By Nafeesa Syeed - The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Dec 10, 2008 18:23:16 EST
WASHINGTON — The Tuskegee Airmen, who made history during World War II as the country’s first black military pilots only to return home to discrimination and exclusion from victory parades, have been invited to Barack Obama’s inauguration.
“I want to come hopping, skipping and jumping!” said 92-year-old Spann Watson, an airman from Westbury, N.Y. who flew above Pennsylvania Avenue for President Truman’s inauguration. “We had a part in changing these United States.”
John L. Harrison Jr. an original airman now in his 80s, also said he plans to attend Barack Obama’s inauguration.
“It makes us very very proud,” said Harrison, of Philadelphia. “And it sort of compensates for a lot of the things that we had to endure in the early days.”
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