Chauncey E. Spencer, Sr.

Q-6-23

Chauncey E. Spencer, Sr., aviation pioneer and Civil Rights activist was born in Lynchburg on 5 Nov. 1906, the son of poet Anne Spencer. He moved to Chicago and by 1934 began pursuing his pilot's license. As a charter member of the National Airmen's Association of America, he and Dale L. White in 1939 made an aeronautical tour from Chicago to Washington, D.C., to lobby for the inclusion of African Americans in the Army Air Corps. This included meeting Senator Harry S Truman. Spencer also worked for the U.S. Air Force and was a public servant in Michigan and California. He lived here from 1977 until his death on 21 Aug. 2002.

Department of Historic Resources, 2004

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References/Bibliographic Citation:

Chauncey Spencer File, Virginia Aeronautical Historical Society Records, Virginia Aviation Museum, Richmond, Virginia; Von Hardestry and Dominick Pisano, Black Wings: The American Black in Aviation (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1983), 15, 33; Michael Laris, “Freedom Flight,” Washington Post Magazine 16 February 2003: 7-9, 22-26, 43; Bennie J. McRae, Jr., “National Airmen Association of America…. Before the Tuskegee Airmen, http://www.coax.net/people/lwf/naaa_chg.htm, 11 March 1994; Bernard C. Nalty and Morris J. MacGregor, Blacks in the Military: Essential Documents (Wilmington, De.: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1981, 96-97; Dominick A. Pisano, To Fill the Skies with Pilots: The Civilian Pilot Training Program, 1939-1946 (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 48-57, 72-77; “Chauncey Edward Spencer,” The News and Advance 23 August 2002: C-2; Chauncey Spencer, Who is Chauncey Spencer? (Detroit: Broadside Press, 1975).