James Harvey, III

James H. Harvey, III, is a distinguished Tuskegee Airman and one of the pilots who won the military’s first “Top Gun” fighter competition in 1949. Harvey received his commission as a Second Lieutenant in the Army Air Corps in 1944 after completing aviation cadet training at Tuskegee Air Force Base in Alabama. Due to superior aviation skills he became the military’s first African American jet fighter pilot to fly missions over Korea. His many awards include the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Harvey retired from the U.S. Air Force in 1965 and joined Oscar Mayer, where he worked in positions of increasing responsibility until retiring in 1980. He and his wife, Pearlie, reside in Denver, Colorado.