Williams, Eldridge Franklin, 11/23/1999

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Eldridge Williams (US Army 1941-1942, Army Air Corps 1942-1945) was completing his B.A. in Education in 1941 when he was drafted. He was trained as a combat engineer and then later became the company clerk for the 35th Engineering Training Battalion. Even before he was part of the 35th at Ft. Leonard Wood, he had been rejected for flight training. Williams shares how he felt and how he dealt with being an African-American soldier during this time of segregation. He tells of how he was accepted into Army Air Corps Officer Training and completed this at Miami Beach as the only black man in the unit. His next assignment brought him Tuskegee Army Air Field as the director of physical fitness and survival training. Williams speaks about the training he undertook to perform his job and about the successful football team from Tuskegee. He states that he remained here until the end of the war when he was discharged. Williams discusses being recalled to duty during the Berlin Airlift crisis in 1948 retiring from the military as a lieutenant colonel in 1963. OHP Control Number 0908

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