War Story--Tuskegee Airmen and General James

General Daniel "Chappy" James

            An advertisement for a PBS show on the Tuskegee Airmen flashed across the screen, and reminded me of an anecdote about the Airmen that I heard years ago when I worked for the City of Seattle (1977-1984).  I had befriended an older zoning inspector, Luis Rivera, who was a jazz musician on the side.  He played piano in the style of Oscar Peterson, and had recorded with such performers as Nancy Wilson (the jazz singer, not the rock guitarist from “Heart”) and the Mills Brothers, on an album called “The Mills Brothers Out West.”

            Lou’s musical ability was inherited from his mother. He had a younger half-brother who became much more prominent than he as a jazz musician—however, I cannot remember the brother’s name, which was not “Rivera.”

            He told me that he had learned from Peterson at a time both were performing in the same city.  During his breaks, he would run across the street to listen, and to watch what Peterson was doing, then go back to his own gig to try it out, and Peterson would take his breaks to listen to Rivera.  Lou realized that Peterson was being purposely deceptive about his playing, to make it harder for Lou to copy.  Finally, Peterson said, “Close enough. Now let me show you how it’s done.”

Lou said that he  and an ensemble were performing one evening for the Tuskegee cadets, but they were being harassed by a white lieutenant. Daniel “Chappie” James, “The singing general” was visiting, and sat in for at least one number. Later, he asked the ensemble if there were anything he could do for them. They didn’t ask for anything, but stated that the lieutenant was giving them a hard time. James called the guy over, and said, “ I’m really enjoying this show, but It’s late, I need to get some rest, so I want you to listen to the rest of this show, then meet me at my airplane when I leave at dawn to give me a detailed report on the rest of the performance.”

It’s an amusing story, but gosh darned internet, I’m not sure its details can be confirmed. The USAF should have been integrated in 1948. After the “Freeman Field Mutiny,” in 1945, white officers were replaced by black officers over the Airmen. That means that a problem with a white lieutenant would have occurred  some time after the  creation of the unit in 1941 and the sweep of  white officers in 1945.   But Daniel James became a Tuskegee cadet in February 1943, and became a second lieutenant in July. He worked as a trainer for the remainder of WW II. He did not become a general until 1969.

On the other hand, the incident could have occurred some years later so that the club where they were performing had been integrated, James had rank enough to give orders to the lieutenant, and it was less an incident of institutional racism as the case of a lieutenant who was just a jerk regardless of his race, and who had probably had too much to drink.

Their discography does not disclose a Mills Brother’s album called “The Mills Brothers Out West.”