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I just learned about this - so don’t take my word for it. But from what I’ve gathered, the French were one of the first Europeans to come out west and explored America around the early 16th century. And in our study of Arkansas’ history we came across this guy Henri de Tonti who, in the late 1600s established a trading post off of the Mississippi River and it later became known as the Arkansas Post.
So who is Tonti? He’s Italian, found the city Detroit with his younger brother, and was the friend and associate of René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle (see above, the one with a sad face, kneeling) - the famed French dude who explored and “claimed” the entire Mississippi area (as in, the state of Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, Kentucky, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota) for France.
Tonti lost his hand during the Sicilian Wars and wore a prosthetic hook. His nickname was “Iron Hand”. I cannot find any connection between Tonti and Captain Hook.
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We were reading about the Tuskegee airmen and I thought the story sounded very familiar and I could picture these beautifully painted pictures of their planes in my head … and then I remembered we own a book about them, a children’s picture book, Wind Flyers. I bought the book because of its beautiful illustrations by Loren Long, without actually paying attention to the story by award-winning writer Angela Johnson.
Looking through the book now and rereading the words, I’m glad to know that at least in the realm of children’s books, writers and illustrators have already been working to create a more accurate history of the American past in little minds.
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Before the Tuskegee Airmen, there have been no black pilots in the US military. They were officially formed in June 1941, as the 99th Fighter Squadron at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. These men flew escort for heavy bombers and had a nearly perfect record, and the Tuskegee Airmen were awarded several Silver Stars, 150 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 8 Purple Hearts, 14 Bronze Stars and 744 Air Medals.
The Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) was founded by Lewis Adams, a former slave Macon County, Alabama. It started as the “Negro Normal School in Tuskegee”, with an annual fund of $2,000. Booker T. Washington, who was 25 years old at the time, was recruited to be its first principal (a position he held till his death in 1915).
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We went to see Spike Lee and James McBride talk about their new movie, Miracle at St. Anna, at the New York Public Library. They have made the very first Hollywood movie about the black soldiers who fought for the United States during the World War II. That sounds incredible, but it is true, and it is disturbing. “Hollywood is great at creating mythology”, Spike Lee said - and this mythology is a nearly all-white US Army that fought in the World War II (and World War I and Vietnam War).
The truth is, at the beginning of the war, some 80 years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, it was difficult for African Americans to be accepted into the army and defend their countrymen. But many came through, and there were 125,000 African Americans who fought oversees during the War World II. They fought in segregated units at the time, and because of their efforts, in 1948 President Harry Truman signed Executive Order 9981 integrating the military and mandating equality of treatment and opportunity (about f*cking time).
James McBride interviewed many of the surviving soldiers of the 92nd Infantry Division, one of the several famous all-black Army units during WWII, and wrote the book which the movie is based on. He asked some of the men why they would risk their lives and fight for a country that cared so little for them, and the men said that they did it for their children and grandchildren.
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