Clarence Lester
*Clarence Lester was born on this date in 1923. He was a Black fighter pilot who served during World War II.
Clarence D. "Lucky" Lester was born in Richmond, Virginia. Raised in Chicago, Illinois, Lester attended West Virginia State College, where he was a star football player and a fraternity brother of Kappa Alpha Psi, Iota chapter at the University of Chicago. In 1942, after turning 19, he enrolled in the Army Air Forces Corps and was assigned to the 100th Fighter Squadron, part of the 332nd Expeditionary Operations Group.
Lester is best known as one of two Tuskegee Airmen who shot down three Focke-Wulf FW 190 or Messerschmitt Bf 109 on a single mission; the other pilot was Captain Joseph Elsberry. Lester was one of only nine Tuskegee Airmen pilots with at least three confirmed kills during World War II. While flying an F-84E Thunder jet, it experienced mechanical failure. It exploded into flames, forcing Lester to parachute from the inflamed jet, which made him "only the sixth pilot ever to use the ejection method." Later in his career, he also worked with the infamous "Whiz Kids" at the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
In 1969, Lester retired as a full colonel and was appointed associate director of social services in Rockville, Maryland. That same year, Lester and three Department of Defense analysts founded the company that would later become ICF International following his military service. The original Inner-City Fund was a venture capital firm aimed at supporting minority-owned businesses in achieving government contracts. In the early 1970s, the company transitioned toward a consulting model and has now achieved over $1.5B in annual revenue.
He was one of the first African American military aviators in the United States Army Air Corps, the United States Army Air Forces, and later the United States Air Force. Lester recalled, "Being a Black pilot in the 1940s was like being a pro athlete today ... We knew we were special, that we would have to prove something. This was the first chance Blacks had outside of working in the kitchen or possibly being a truck driver." White pilots would fly around 50 combat missions, but because there were no replacements, Black pilots of the Tuskegee Airmen flew around 70 missions. During the war, he flew over 90 combat missions.
Clarence Lester died on March 17, 1986. He was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 2006.
