A-TRAIN_ Memoirs of a Tuskegee by Lieutenant Colonel Charles W Dryden

The Tuskegee Airmen / ta001_1

Photographer: Brenda J. Turner
02/19/2001

A-TRAIN: Memoirs of a Tuskegee Airman is an autobiography of Lieutenant Colonel Charles W. Dryden, a prominent and very active member of the group of several hundred black airmen who were trained to fly in the skies over Alabama in the early 1940s, who fought the air war in Europe during World War II, and who simultaneously lived through the tempestuous life that the United States has imposed on its black citizens throughout all of our lives.

Reviewer: Paul B Yuanlin
Taiwan
Charles Dryden's book forces people to see the trials and tribulations encountered by black servicemen and women during WWII. I was shocked to read about the different encounters with 'Jim Crow' that Dryden and his peers waded through during their service years. A must for anybody curious about WWII, the Tuskegee Airmen or about the fight for civil rights in America.

Reviewer: Mark Dement (see more about me) Savannah, Georgia
A definitive study in courage: I meet Col. Dryden when he gave a talk about his experiences and his book. I then read the book a felt a tremendous respect for the author and all the Tuskegee Airmen. Col. Dryden tells his personal story in a way that made me feel as though I was there with him the whole time. The challanges of blacks in America in his story left a powerful impact on me, the courage the author displayed is an inspiration. A-Train is very well written and reads easily. It is an powerful story that left me feeling inadequate and ashamed to be white. I had the oportunity to meet Col. Dryden again and sought him out just to shake his hand again, knowing him from his book, it was hard to
hide my emotions.

Reviewer: A reader from USA
Every young African American boy should read this book. It is an inspiration.

Reviewer: Paul
USA
Excellent memoir of a man from an interesting age. I initially bought this book expecting it to be similar to the other slew of WWII books out there ( The ME-109 dove at me out of the sun with guns blazing...). Instead I got an honest account of a man who wanted to fly for his country and be treated with the same respect as any other pilot. Dryden's memories and descriptions of his voyage through training to be a pilot as well as the segregated and de-segregated Air Force are interesting and honest. Dryden't narrative is not the heart-pounding, can't-put-the-book down type but rather the story of a man who, faced with tremendous adversity from his own society and country, persevered. There is no bitterness in Dryden's story, and I put the book down tremendously impressed by his belief in himself, in his religion and his friend. It's a good book