Jim Harrison had wanted to fly from the time he was a youngster, pretending he had a cockpit in a gum tree at his Texas home.
He got his wish and became a Tuskegee Airman, retiring as a major.
Harrison, 85, of Lakewood, died Dec. 6. He was one of an estimated 300 Tuskegee Airmen still living.
The Tuskegee Airmen, the first African-American group of U.S. military pilots, were segregated from other airmen.
In 2007, he and other Tuskegee Airmen (including five from Colorado) were invited to Washington and given the Congressional Gold Medal.
Though Tuskegee Airmen weren’t always discriminated against openly, “there was subtle racism,” said a friend, John Brown.
“But Jim just didn’t dwell on it; he rose above it,” Brown said.
President George W. Bush referred to the discrimination when he presented the medals to Harrison and the other. Bush called the medals “a gesture to help atone for all the unreturned salutes and unforgivable indignities.”
Harrison was active at St. Jude Catholic Church in Lakewood and the Knights of Columbus.
“I learned from Jim that if you are quiet, calm and don’t lose your composure, you can make a lot of headway” in life, said Dave Porta, a friend from the church.
“He was an intelligent person who could talk about any subject,” said his daughter, Jeannette Harrison-Sullivan of Marblehead, Mass.
“And he was a good storyteller,” she said. “He could talk your ear off.”
James Edwin Harrison Sr. was born Sept. 4, 1925, in Fordyce, Ark.
He attended what is now Prairie View A&M University in Prairie View, Texas, and joined the Army Air Corps in 1943. He flew with the 332nd Fighter Group.
Harrison married Margaret Phillips on Feb. 13, 1946. They had met in Tuskegee, Ala., while he was in pilot training.
After World War II, Harrison was in the occupation forces in Japan.
He later was with the Strategic Air Command as a B-52 commander.
He retired in 1964 and got a job at United Airlines, where he was an instructor for the DC-8 and DC-10 airliners, his wife said.
In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by two sons, Michael W. Harrison of Sacramento, Calif., and James E. Harrison Jr. of Lakewood; four grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
