Dallas / Fort Worth Local News

GRAPEVINE (AP) ― The bell rang 37 times to mark the deaths of the recently fallen Tuskegee Airmen. Eugene Richardson stood up eight times, once for each friend who had died this year.

"These were all heroes that I knew personally. We went through a heck of a lot together," the 82-year-old World War II pilot said as he fingered his bronze replica of a Congressional Gold Medal.

The ranks of the Tuskegee Airmen, like all veterans of World War II, are thinning rapidly as historians scramble to preserve their memories and solidify their legacy.

Only six Lonely Eagles - the name given to Tuskegee airmen who have passed away - were memorialized in a similar ceremony two years ago. This year, that number increased six-fold.

Nearly 1,000 of the black fighter pilots trained in a segregated Army Air Corps unit in Tuskegee, Ala. Only about 125 are still living.

The airmen were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in March at a ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda attended by President Bush and congressional leaders. The original gold medal is at the Smithsonian in Washington. Each airman was given a bronze replica.

Robert Ashby, a retired lieutenant colonel and Tuskegee Airman who now lives in Phoenix, said he was sad that more of those pilots "who stood up when the world said sit down" weren't there in March to receive the honor or today to share memories.

"When you look at the armed forces back then, it was full of discrimination. The people around me and the guys who have passed on changed all that, to where the Air Force is as equal opportunity as any place now, if not more," he said.

Even after the black airmen were admitted to the Army, many commanders continued to believe they didn't have the intelligence, courage and patriotism to do what was being asked of them.

Not allowed to practice or fight with their white counterparts, the Tuskegee Airmen distinguished themselves by painting the tails of their airplanes red, which led to them becoming known as the "Red Tails."

More than 400 airmen saw combat in Europe, the Mediterranean and North Africa. They escorted bomber aircraft on missions and protected them from enemy fighter planes. Dozens died in the fighting; others were taken prisoners of war.

One thousand World War II veterans die each day. In 2000, there were six million veterans of World War II, but only half of those remain today, said Bob Patrick, director of The Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress.

The project is geared toward recording an oral history of veterans. The task takes on more urgency with smaller groups like the Tuskegee Airmen.

"They are leaving us very quickly and we particularly don't want to lose the very rich and interesting story they present," Patrick said.

At their annual convention in this suburb northwest of Dallas, several original pilots were lined up to sit in front of Ralph Smith's camera and tell their stories. Smith runs the Western Region Tuskegee Airmen Archive at the University of California-Riverside.

So far this year, the archive has recorded more than 100 interviews with airmen and many of the 19,000 other service members, also African Americans from the Tuskegee era, affiliated with the organization.

"This is an opportunity to record history and prevent the plague of prejudice, one airman at a time," Smith said.

The Tuskegee Airmen's nonprofit corporation has 51 chapters across the country. They promote education initiatives, especially in aviation, among black youth.

Lt. Col. Bertha Jackson, 51, an Air Force flight nurse from New Jersey, said the Tuskegee Airmen laid the groundwork for not only minorities but women. She had watched movies and read stories about the pilots, but said being among them was still a humbling experience.

"To know what they had to go through -- being in harm's way, then coming home to hate -- I think that effort has paved the way for me," she said.

(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)