AOPA hosts McGee family at First Flight celebration
Family members of the late Brig. Gen. Charles McGee, a renowned Tuskegee Airman and combat pilot through three wars, attended this week’s annual Wright Brothers Day celebration, which honored McGee with induction into the Paul E. Garber Shrine.
AOPA traveled with the McGee family to the First Flight Society event, which marked the 121st anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first powered flight at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, in 1903.
McGee was best known as a member of the Tuskegee Airmen, the Army Air Corps’ first African American fighter squadron. Members of the famous unit underwent initial training in Tuskegee, Alabama, flying Boeing PT–17 Stearmans before moving on to fighters including the North American P–51 Mustang and Curtiss P–40 Warhawk.
McGee had a remarkable military career that included 136 combat missions during World War II, 100 missions during the Korean War, and another 173 in Vietnam. He died in 2022 at age 102.
AOPA named an award to honor McGee, presented “to an individual who, like General McGee, persevered to overcome challenges en route to learning to fly while inspiring others along the way” and who demonstrates “leadership in aviation and showcase[s] the opportunities in aviation to youth and young adults.” The honor was bestowed on Ramone Hemphill, founder of The 99th Squadron Inc., in 2023, and on Theresa Claiborne, the first African American female pilot in the U.S. Air Force, in 2024.
In 2019, AOPA held a celebration of McGee’s 100th birthday at its headquarters in Frederick, Maryland. During the weekend-long party, the general piloted a Cirrus SF50 Vision Jet and flew with AOPA President Mark Baker in the cockpit of a Cessna Citation M2. Once a pilot, always a pilot.
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