The Flight of the Bumblebee World War II's black pilots had two
war to fight. - By Louis R. Purnell - Air & Space magazine,
November 1989 In October 1925 the Army War College prepared a
report for the U.S. Army chief of staff. Titled “The Use of
Negro Manpower in War,” it concluded that blacks were fair
laborers but inferior technicians and fighters. It also stated
that the cranial cavity of the Negro was much smaller than the
white’s and that the Negro’s brain weighed 35 ounces, versus 45
ounces for the white’s. Other studies concluded that blacks
lacked patriotism, were difficult to discipline, told lies, and
ran off in times of danger. It was upon this basis that the
faculty and students of the Army War College and, in later
years, officials at the Pentagon decided that no blacks should
ever become pilots in the Army Air Corps. That always reminds me
of an old theory that holds that because of its wingspan-to-
weight ratio, the bumblebee shouldn’t be able to fly. But the
bee, unaware of this, flies anyhow.