--- description: On the anniversary of the Tuskegee Airmen's activation in 1941, a look back at how the pilots got their wings. title: When the Tuskegee Airmen Got Their Wings image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0adfd858712d6452/698782cc3c1639746b4522b0/150209-tuskegee-airmen-01.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # When the Tuskegee Airmen Got Their Wings  by [Eliza Berman](/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 19, 2015 12:00 PM CUT  Caption from LIFE. Flying cadets hear a brief lecture on wind currents from Lieutenant McCune. Caption from LIFE. Flying cadets hear a brief lecture on wind currents from Lieutenant McCune.Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  by [Eliza Berman](/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 19, 2015 12:00 PM CUT When members of the 99th Pursuit Squadron got their wings in March 1942, the honor was more than just recognition of the training they’d undergone to serve as pilots in the U.S. military. As LIFE wrote that month, “Upon their performance and promise hang the hopes of additional thousands of aspiring Negro fliers throughout the land.” The Tuskegee Airmen, first activated for training at Chanute Field, Illinois, on March 19, 1941, served as the first black pilots in the U.S. military. Their admission came only after decades of pressure from civil rights and labor leaders advocating for equal opportunity in the military. Though it represented progress, the military into which these pilots flew was still segregated, and would remain so until 1948. LIFE photographed the first class of lieutenants, including leader Benjamin O. Davis, Jr., a West Point graduate whose father had been the Army’s first black general officer. In total, 992 pilots would be trained in Tuskegee, about one third of whom would be deployed overseas. Eighty-four would lose their lives, including 68 in action, with another 32 captured as prisoners of war. The emotion that courses through Gabriel Benzur’s photographs is pride. And LIFE’s readers overwhelmingly applauded the photo essay as crucial to “building up confidence, morale and patriotism” and “an incentive to all races and creeds to unify their efforts for victory.” An attorney from Detroit, William C. Smith, wrote the editors to express what it meant to see the airmen in the magazine. “In spite of the often unhappy treatment we have received, both in and out of government, we know that this is our America, we want to do our share.” _Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at_ [_@LizabethRonk_](https://twitter.com/LizabethRonk "undefined")_._  Caption from LIFE. Flying cadets hear a brief lecture on wind currents from Lieutenant McCune. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Captain Davis reviews new cadets undergoing pre-flight training at base. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Major George Spencer Roberts, in training for US Army Air Corps 99th Pursuit Squadron, during flight school training at airfield, 1942. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Cadets in primary training are hazed by older hands who have completed their solo flights. As at West Point and Annapolis, green cadets at Tuskegee base must execute orders snappily, do small chores and answer fantastic questions politely and precisely. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Captain Benjamin O. Davis Jr., ldr. of US Army Air Corps 99th Pursuit Squadron, at flight-training school, 1942. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Past statue of Booker T. Washington, founder of Tuskegee Institute, march the vanguard of 400 negro fliers who will eventually compose the Army's 99th Pursuit Squadron. Their base will be one of nation's top squadron fields. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Captain Benjamin O. Davis Jr., of US Army Air Corps 99th Pursuit Squadron, in cockpit, greeted by other cadets at flight-training school, 1942. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Cadet Custis, in training for US Army Air Corps 99th Pursuit Squadron, showing sharecropper's children aircraft engine on runway of flight school airfield, 1942. Gabriel Benzur—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Cadets wave goodbye to Capt. Davis as he takes off on demonstration flight. 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