Marlon D. Green fought and won the right to fly as a pilot for a major U.S. airline.

During World War II, the U.S. Navy did not have a program that allowed African Americans to train and fly as naval aviators. Jesse Leroy Brown, however, fought through many hurdles to become the first African American to complete Navy flight training. Discover his story.

Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden was NASA's first African American Administrator. He also served in the military and logged over 680 hours in space.

Cornelius Coffey was an advocate for the education of Black Americans in aeronautics.  

Frank01 and Frank02—The call signs used on the mission to shoot down a Chinese observation balloon, were a direct reference to the accomplished “balloon busting” career of Frank Luke Jr. Learn about the historical thread connecting a balloon over the United States to the skies above World War I Europe.

In the fifties and sixties to get hired as a stewardess put you in a club that was akin to being a movie star. Around this time, a highly qualified woman, top of her training class, beautiful and poised, didn't understand why she wasn't being hired, until an instructor told her it was because she was Black.

As a cub in the 1930s, Gilmore made aviation history when he traveled around the United States with the flamboyant and colorful aviator Roscoe Turner as a mascot for the Gilmore Oil Company. Read and see images of the detailed discoveries made during the initial examination of the conservation treatment of Gilmore.

Museum curator emerita Valerie Neal reflects and shares her memories of Space Shuttle Columbia's disaster on the 20th anniversary of STS-107.

Chawla made history as the first Indian woman, and the first South Asian American woman, to fly in space. Discover her story.

The pigeon – ubiquitous bird, oft city-dweller, and… war hero? You might even consider the humble pigeon to be the first military aviator.