After blowing up a German cargo train and crash landing in Austria during World War II, Tuskegee Airman Harold Brown thought it was the end. A mob of more than 25 furious villagers took the young Minneapolis man to a tree, and indicated they planned to hang him.
A local constable armed with a rifle intervened and held off the mob, sparing Brown's life. He survived six weeks as a prisoner of war, then went on to live 78 more years in an impressive career that, along with his fellow members of the all-Black 332nd Fighter Group, helped bring an end to segregation in the U.S. military.
Brown died Jan. 12 at age 98 in Ohio, where he had lived for many years, after growing up in Minneapolis and graduating from North Community High School in 1942. He is survived by his wife, Marsha Bordner, and a daughter.
He also was one of the last living among the Tuskegee Airmen. In an interview, Bordner said she hopes Brown's persistence in his quest to become a pilot, and the impact of his fighter group, is never forgotten.
"Their story changed the course of history, it led to the desegregation of the military, so it couldn't be lost to time," said Bordner, who co-wrote a 2017 book with Brown about his life.
Brown was born in 1924 in Minneapolis to parents who had migrated from the American South. As a teenager he worked as a soda jerk, saving up $35 selling soda and ice cream to help pay for flying lessons. There were very few Black pilots at the time, and some people held the stereotypical belief that Black men were not intelligent enough to fly a plane, Brown wrote in his memoir.
But Brown was always laser-focused on becoming a pilot, and never let slights or jokes get in the way of his goals.
"I've always had a passion for learning, for setting goals and achieving them, for being as good or better than others in like circumstances around me," he wrote in his book.
