Freedom to Serve: The Legacy of Executive Order 9981

The AFEHRI’s mission is to support the Barnes Center for Enlisted Education mission by educating and inspiring enlisted leaders on our enlisted history, heritage, and the resulting contribution to air and space power.

The Air Force Historical Research Agency is the repository for Air Force historical documents. The Agency's collection, begun in Washington, DC, during World War II, moved in 1949 to Maxwell Air Force Base, the site of Air University, to provide research facilities for professional military education students, the faculty, visiting scholars, and the general public. It consists today of over 70,000,000 pages devoted to the history of the service, and represents the world's largest and most valuable organized collection of documents on US military aviation.

The Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum was established to preserve the papers, books, and other historical materials relating to former President Harry S. Truman and to make them available to the people in a place suitable for exhibit and research. Consistently ranked among the top tourism destinations in the Kansas City region, no visit to America's heartland is complete without a trip to the Harry S. Truman Library & Museum.

A collection of correspondence between A. Philip Randolph and President John F. Kennedy about civil rights issues.

To commemorate the 70th anniversary of Executive Order 9981, the Veterans History Project offers this online presentation, featuring the collections of fifteen African American veterans who served before, after or in the midst of desegregation. Their stories describe the struggles these men and women faced in serving their country—oftentimes, even as it discriminated against them—and the battles they fought to prove themselves worthy of full participation in the military.

A collection from Library of Congress on the efforts of A. Philip Randolph and NAACP in their fight for civil rights. Since 1964, the Library of Congress has served as its official repository, and the NAACP Records now consist of approximately five million items dating from 1909 to 2010. The records encompass a wide variety of materials, including manuscripts, photographs, prints, pamphlets, broadsides, audiotapes, phonograph records, films, and video recordings. Every phase of the NAACP's many activities can be found in this rich and diverse collection.

The museum is a repository for the oral and written history of the Tuskegee Airmen and boasts the largest collection of Airmen artifacts in the world. With respect for the past and solid investment in the future, the museum relishes being a springboard to inspire the next generation of aviators and aerospace enthusiasts through targeted youth programs.

The National Museum of the United States Air Force is the official museum of the United States Air Force located at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, six miles northeast of Dayton, Ohio. The NMUSAF is the oldest and largest military aviation museum in the world, with more than 360 aircraft and missiles on display.

The National WWII Museum tells the story of the American experience in the war that changed the world—why it was fought, how it was won, and what it means today—so that all generations will understand the price of freedom and be inspired by what they learn.

The Rand Corporation is a research organization that develops solutions to public policy challenges to help make communities throughout the world safer and more secure, healthier and more prosperous.

The hangars at Moton Field have been rehabilitated to house artifacts related to the Tuskegee Airmen. The museum is free to the public, so you can explore the history of the Tuskegee Airmen and even see a plane they flew.

The Tuskegee Airmen were not the only ones making history at Tuskegee Army Air Field (TAAF) in Tuskegee, Alabama, during the 1940s. The nurses who served on the base had to fight gender as well as racial discrimination. This site serves as an information platform to recognize the women who served in the Army Nurse Corps during World War II at Tuskegee Army Air Field.

The Six Triple Eight battalion was the only predominantly black female unit that served overseas during WWII. The unit resolved a growing mail crisis during the war by ensuring American troops received their letters and packages from home. Their nickname was “Six-Triple Eight" and their motto was “No Mail, Low Morale.” See list of 800 plus names in this site.