Woodrow Crockett

Woodrow Wilson Crockett (August 31, 1918 – August 16, 2012) (pronounced "Croc-et") was an officer in the U.S. Army Air Force/U.S. Air Force and a fighter pilot and interim commanding officer of the all-African American 332nd Fighter Group's 100th Fighter Squadron, best known as the Tuskegee Airmen or "Red Tails". He was one of the 1,007 documented Tuskegee Airmen Pilots.

Crockett is well known as one of the first U.S. military pilots selected to fly at Mach 2 speeds on June 2, 1959.

Early life and family

Nicknamed "Woody" by his family, Crockett was born on August 31, 1918, in Homan, Arkansas, Miller County, Arkansas. After the eighth grade, Crockett moved to Little Rock, Arkansas to live with an older sister so that he could attend Arkansas' famed Dunbar High School, one of Arkansas' only high schools for African Americans. After reading a pilot recruitment flyer, Crockett transferred to the Tuskegee's pilot cadet training program in August 1942. During World War II, Crockett flew 149 missions within a 15-month span. In June 1944 during a mission, Crockett contemporaneously assumed command of the 100th Squadron after squadron commander Lieutenant Robert B. Tresville and his plane crashed into the Mediterranean Sea; Tresville was later presumed missing in action and deceased. Fellow squadron pilot Andrew D. Turner would assume permanent command of the 100th Fighter Squadron.

Crockett flew 45 missions in the Korean war. Crockett was a member of the Twenty-fifth Air Division, and served at various U.S. Air Force bases. Both Crockett and his wife Daisy Juanita McMurray Crockett are interred at Arlington National Cemetery in Section 59 Site 31.

Legacy Crockett's World War II flight suit is displayed at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.