Petersen was first black Marine pilot and general
Frank E. Petersen Jr., who became the first black U.S. Marine Corps pilot and general officer, took the navy’s entrance exam in 1950. The questions, he later recalled, were “relatively unremarkable.”
The petty officer third class overseeing the test called him a few days later, asking, “Would you mind retaking the examination?”
It was not hard for the future three-star general to decode the reason for the request: His score was high, and the implication was that he had cheated. Again, he aced the test, and the petty officer exclaimed: “Petersen, my boy, the navy has opportunities for guys like you ... My, God, man, what a great steward you’d make!”
The remark was particularly painful for Petersen, who said he had turned to the military because he hoped it would an escape from pervasive racial prejudice in his native Kansas.
Petersen, who died Aug. 25 at 83, joined the U.S. navy in June 1950 as a seaman apprentice and the next year entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program. He was motivated by the Korean War combat death of Jesse Brown, the navy’s first black aviator.
In 1968, he did a tour of duty in Vietnam, where he commanded a tactical air squadron and served in more than 250 missions. He received the Purple Heart for wounds suffered when he ejected after his plane was struck by anti-aircraft fire over the demilitarized zone.
He accumulated more than 4,000 hours in fighter and attack aircraft. In the early 1970s, he took administrative jobs and began his rapid ascent through the ranks, working to recruit more black officers and holding a command post at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, N.C.
In 1979, he was promoted to brigadier-general and was named the NAACP’s man of the year. He became a lieutenantgeneral in 1986 and spent two years as commanding general of the Combat Development Command at Quantico, Va.
Frank Emmanuel Petersen Jr. was born in Topeka, Kan., on March 2, 1932. He grew up enthralled with flight, watching B-29 bombers take off at a nearby air field during the Second World War.
Late in his career and in retirement, he often was asked about progress on race relations in the armed forces and society.
He recalled the years after his return from Korea, when he continued to face vicious discrimination. He said he wore his uniform everywhere, figuring that if anyone attacked him, it would be a federal offence.
Tensions exploded during the Vietnam War, when strife over perceived racism in assignments, military justice and promotion at times seemed to threaten the military’s ability to carry out its missions.