Friends,

We have arrived home safely again. It is the first time the family and I have been together in New Orleans in two months. It was a rough two months in some ways, but the last week spent in Auburn, AL and its environs was a marvelous reunion. I am still working through some top ten lists from that trip, of which here are a few:

TulaneLSU's Top 10 staircases of Auburn University
TulaneLSU's Top 10 trees of Auburn University
TulaneLSU’s Top 10 flowers of Auburn University
TulaneLSU's Top 10 pizzas of Auburn, AL
TulaneLSU's guide to Goodwater, AL
TulaneLSU's Top 10 signs of Ashland, AL
TulaneLSU's review of The Hotel at Auburn University

On the ride back home, we took the interstate toward Montgomery. Shortly after joining the interstate, I saw one of those brown and white signs that indicates something of historical significance was near us. I begged Uncle, “Please let us stop at this one.” He knew from experience that if we did not, I would be whining about what great history we had missed for the next hour. Surely, I am not the only one who stops every time he sees one of those signs.

As we exited the interstate, there was a freshly built, and quite busy, Popeye’s. Had we not just had pizza in Auburn, I would have ordered the sixth best sandwich in America. We had arrived in Tuskegee, Alabama.

Before the trip I knew so little about Tuskegee that it is embarrassing. Today, it is a dying town, like many small towns in Alabama, indeed, throughout the world. As people rush to chase their dreams, which are thinly veiled outlines of greed, they leave the towns that formed them, choosing to the big city instead. It will be interesting if the recent pandemic reverses that trend, but I doubt it will.

Everyone knows it, at least superficially, for the syphilis experiment, which spanned from 1932 to 1972. I was shocked to read just how recent that experiment was. In the experiment, scientists, clearly lacking the Christian ethics upon which our nation was founded, chose to watch the disease progression of syphilis in black men. 600 men were in the study, 399 had latent syphilis. They were told they had “bad blood,” and were all offered free health care. Never were they told they had syphilis. For forty years,not a single infected man was informed he could spread the disease to his wife, children, and others in the community. At least 40 wives did become infected and at least 19 children of these men were born with congenital syphilis. When penicillin became a proven effective and safe treatment for the disease in 1947, not one received a dose of the cure. The scientists were too interested in watching how the disease would progress.

Tuskegee is more than just an unethical experiment. It is also home of the training grounds for the Tuskegee Airmen. Today, there is a National Parks Service museum at Moton Field to celebrate one of the airfields they used in their training. From 1940 until President Truman desegregated the military in 1948, the Tuskegee Airmen were an elite group of black pilots who trained for multiple squadrons used in World War II. One of the instructors, Daniel “Chappie” James, became the first black four star general, and possibly the inspiration for Louis Gossett Jr.’s “Chappy” character in the Iron Eagle films.

It was a little warm, so I was the only one to exit the car. I walked around alone for about twenty minutes trying to imagine what it would have been like 80 years ago to be a young black pilot training in the middle of the Jim Crow South.

We followed the signs for the Tuskegee Institute National Site, passing an old cemetery. I really wanted to stop there to walk and take pictures, but Uncle said, “We don’t have time. Take pictures of all these dilapidated houses. They’re as good as grave sites.” True enough, there is a fallen splendor in driving through Tuskegee. It appears it was once home to some wealth, witnessed by some impressive homes, mostly in disrepair.

The sister building of the building pictured below, which sits nearby, though, across the street. I could not discover what this building was. Perhaps a home or a law office.

Tuskegee National Alumni Association, named for Jock Smith, a trial lawyer. Its roof may have been damaged by recent storms.

This post was edited on 5/18/20 at 7:56 am