thedrifter
07-26-08, 08:00 AM
The Florida Times-Union
July 26, 2008
Black vets reflect on desegregation
By Jeff Brumley,
The Times-Union
Few are likely more grateful to Harry S. Truman for desegregating the military - 60 years ago today - than James Tippins.
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Tippins joined the Marine Corps in 1953 in search of solid job training and money for college. His plan was to serve just one hitch.
But things didn't quite work out that way.
As his three-year enlistment drew to a close, and not long after returning from the war in Korea, Tippins took his military electronics and communications training to Jacksonville, where he applied for a job with a telephone company.
"I will always remember this," he said. "The supervisor said, 'You probably are more qualified than most of the people working here, but I can only put a broom in your hands.' "
Tippins was astounded.
"I was a sergeant in the Marine Corps, and I didn't want no broom in my hand," the 73-year-old Northwest Jacksonville resident said. "So I didn't get out of the Marine Corps until I put my 20 years in."
That extended service meant a tour in Vietnam, where he fought through the Tet Offensive of 1968.
"We used to get hit every night," he said of mortar and rocket-propelled grenade rounds that showered onto his Da Nang base.
After that tour, he spent several years as a recruiter and instructor in Marine electronics and communications schools. He retired as a master sergeant in 1974.
The phone company experience was a wake-up call that the sweeping desegregation that Truman mandated in the military was still years away in the civilian population, especially in Jacksonville and the South, Tippins said.
That incident and many other off-base encounters with racism engendered Tippins' feeling of gratitude to Truman and an interest in the history of integration of blacks into the military.
Today, Tippins is president of the Jacksonville chapter of the Montford Point Marines, a black Marines veterans group. Its name comes from the base near Camp Lejeune, N.C., where African-Americans underwent recruit training until 1949.
Besides Truman, the post-desegregation veterans also are grateful to black vets who went before them.
"I've talked to a lot of the old fellas - they fought for the right to fight."
One of the people who fought for that right is William Surcey. The 89-year-old former Army master sergeant was an aircraft mechanic with the famed Tuskegee Airmen of World War II. The all-black combat air unit struck fear in the hearts of Axis aviators in the skies over Europe.
Surcey said he didn't experience much racism in uniform, mainly because the Tuskegee Airmen - like most other African-American service members - were separated from their white colleagues.
The unit had its own bases, with all positions - from pilots and mechanics to police and air traffic controllers - filled by blacks.
Outside of all-black units, African-Americans were usually relegated to support and service roles, such as cooks or truck drivers.
But for Surcey, the exposure to racist America was suspended until the days before his release from the military in 1946.
"A white officer said, 'Now you can go back to picking cotton,' " Surcey said.
After the service, he worked briefly as a civilian aircraft mechanic at Jacksonville Naval Air Station, then had a career with the Postal Service.
Tippins experienced the same off-base segregation in places as wide-ranging as California, North Carolina and New Jersey. Those instances usually came when he and fellow Marines would go on leave, forcing them to separate because of prohibitions against blacks being in whites-only businesses.
He also ran into problems finding housing when he was posted as a recruiter in Trenton, N.J.
"You had more rights on the base than you did in town," Tippins said. "It was like another world sometimes."
jeff.brumley@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4310
Military desegregation timeline
September 1945: Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson appoints a board of three generals to investigate the Army's policy with respect to African-Americans and to prepare a new policy. It was called the Gillem Board, after its chairman, Gen. Alvan C. Gillem Jr.
February 1946: African-American World War II veteran Isaac Woodard is attacked and blinded by policemen in Aiken, S.C.
July 1946: A white mob takes two African-American veterans and their wives from their car near Monroe, Ga., before shooting them to death; their bodies are found to contain 60 bullets.
January 1948: President Truman decides to end segregation in the armed forces and the civil service through executive order rather than through legislation.
July 26, 1948: Truman signs Executive Order 9981, which states: "It is hereby declared to be the policy of the President that there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin." Source: The Harry S. Truman Library & Museum, www.trumanlibrary.org.~~~ONLINE James Tippins tells his story at jacksonville.com/video. SUNDAY IN INSIGHT Who are privates and ensigns most likely to salute? Find out which group in the military is lacking in star status.
Ellie
July 26, 2008
Black vets reflect on desegregation
By Jeff Brumley,
The Times-Union
Few are likely more grateful to Harry S. Truman for desegregating the military - 60 years ago today - than James Tippins.
--------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------
Tippins joined the Marine Corps in 1953 in search of solid job training and money for college. His plan was to serve just one hitch.
But things didn't quite work out that way.
As his three-year enlistment drew to a close, and not long after returning from the war in Korea, Tippins took his military electronics and communications training to Jacksonville, where he applied for a job with a telephone company.
"I will always remember this," he said. "The supervisor said, 'You probably are more qualified than most of the people working here, but I can only put a broom in your hands.' "
Tippins was astounded.
"I was a sergeant in the Marine Corps, and I didn't want no broom in my hand," the 73-year-old Northwest Jacksonville resident said. "So I didn't get out of the Marine Corps until I put my 20 years in."
That extended service meant a tour in Vietnam, where he fought through the Tet Offensive of 1968.
"We used to get hit every night," he said of mortar and rocket-propelled grenade rounds that showered onto his Da Nang base.
After that tour, he spent several years as a recruiter and instructor in Marine electronics and communications schools. He retired as a master sergeant in 1974.
The phone company experience was a wake-up call that the sweeping desegregation that Truman mandated in the military was still years away in the civilian population, especially in Jacksonville and the South, Tippins said.
That incident and many other off-base encounters with racism engendered Tippins' feeling of gratitude to Truman and an interest in the history of integration of blacks into the military.
Today, Tippins is president of the Jacksonville chapter of the Montford Point Marines, a black Marines veterans group. Its name comes from the base near Camp Lejeune, N.C., where African-Americans underwent recruit training until 1949.
Besides Truman, the post-desegregation veterans also are grateful to black vets who went before them.
"I've talked to a lot of the old fellas - they fought for the right to fight."
One of the people who fought for that right is William Surcey. The 89-year-old former Army master sergeant was an aircraft mechanic with the famed Tuskegee Airmen of World War II. The all-black combat air unit struck fear in the hearts of Axis aviators in the skies over Europe.
Surcey said he didn't experience much racism in uniform, mainly because the Tuskegee Airmen - like most other African-American service members - were separated from their white colleagues.
The unit had its own bases, with all positions - from pilots and mechanics to police and air traffic controllers - filled by blacks.
Outside of all-black units, African-Americans were usually relegated to support and service roles, such as cooks or truck drivers.
But for Surcey, the exposure to racist America was suspended until the days before his release from the military in 1946.
"A white officer said, 'Now you can go back to picking cotton,' " Surcey said.
After the service, he worked briefly as a civilian aircraft mechanic at Jacksonville Naval Air Station, then had a career with the Postal Service.
Tippins experienced the same off-base segregation in places as wide-ranging as California, North Carolina and New Jersey. Those instances usually came when he and fellow Marines would go on leave, forcing them to separate because of prohibitions against blacks being in whites-only businesses.
He also ran into problems finding housing when he was posted as a recruiter in Trenton, N.J.
"You had more rights on the base than you did in town," Tippins said. "It was like another world sometimes."
jeff.brumley@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4310
Military desegregation timeline
September 1945: Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson appoints a board of three generals to investigate the Army's policy with respect to African-Americans and to prepare a new policy. It was called the Gillem Board, after its chairman, Gen. Alvan C. Gillem Jr.
February 1946: African-American World War II veteran Isaac Woodard is attacked and blinded by policemen in Aiken, S.C.
July 1946: A white mob takes two African-American veterans and their wives from their car near Monroe, Ga., before shooting them to death; their bodies are found to contain 60 bullets.
January 1948: President Truman decides to end segregation in the armed forces and the civil service through executive order rather than through legislation.
July 26, 1948: Truman signs Executive Order 9981, which states: "It is hereby declared to be the policy of the President that there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin." Source: The Harry S. Truman Library & Museum, www.trumanlibrary.org.~~~ONLINE James Tippins tells his story at jacksonville.com/video. SUNDAY IN INSIGHT Who are privates and ensigns most likely to salute? Find out which group in the military is lacking in star status.
Ellie