ALVA TEMPLE
ALVA TEMPLE, FAMED WWII TUSKEGEE AIRMAN, DEAD AT 87
From "The Tulsa World," Wednesday, September 1, 2004, Section A, Page 11
COLUMBUS, Miss (AP) -- Alva Temple, one of the famed Tuskegee Airmen who became the nation's first black military pilots, died Saturday at his home. He was 87.
Temple was in the Air Force for 20 years and completed 120 missions during World War II, his wife, Lucille Temple, said.
Temple trained at Tuskegee, Ala., as part of a Pentagon program during the war. The training was rigorous; only 992 men became Tuskegee Airmen.
The black pilots -- known as "Red Tails" for the color of the rear of their planes -- were credited with shooting down more than 100 enemy aircraft and never losing an American bomber to enemy fighters.
"We like to think that we played a part in the integration," Temple said earlier this year. "All I can say is, things are not as bad as they used to be. New opportunites have been opened up to our blacks."
Temple, who owned a gas station, was born Sept. 5, 1917, in rural Carrollton, Ala. The cause of his death was not released.
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