New EAA Museum Exhibit Honors First Black Naval Aviator

A new exhibit that opened on April 23 in the EAA Aviation Museum’s Eagle Hangar honors the late Thomas Hudner, a Korean War Medal of Honor recipient, with a Corsair aircraft that replaced the one Hudner used in his heroic actions that earned him the Medal of Honor. The airplane has been in the EAA collection for 40 years and was fully restored in 1994 with the markings of World War II ace Kenneth Walsh. Recent research into the aircraft log books, however, showed the Corsair was a replacement for the Corsair that Hudner crash-landed in Korea in 1950 in an attempt to save fellow pilot Jesse Brown, the U.S. Navy’s first Black naval aviator. Hudner logged many hours and multiple carrier landings in the EAA aircraft, which after its Navy service was owned by several individuals before it was donated to EAA in 1982.