LT George Sutcliffe, USAF was born in North Providence and graduated from Mt. Pleasant High in 1940. He enlisted in the Army Air Corps shortly after Pearl Harbor, and graduated from flight school in May 1943. Sutcliffe deployed to Europe with the 368th Fighter Group, flying the P47 Thunderbolt. Prior to D-Day, their mission was […]
Giuseppe (Joseph) Taglione (1898-1976) was born in Brazil, one of 11 children. He came to the US and his family settled in Providence in 1907. He worked as an auto and truck driver, and was bitten by the aviation bug at an early age. In 1920 he made his first flight out of the grass […]
A long-time Warwick resident, Albert Tavani is credited with bringing the state airport system from its infancy in the 1940s to the full-service network that now exists. When he retired at the end of 1977, Green Airport was greatly expanded, numerous airlines were serving Rhode Island, and there were five state airports in addition to […]
Lieutenant Robert Thorpe, US Army Air Corps, a Providence native and Cranston High School grad, was captured and beheaded by the Japanese in 1944. His remains have never been recovered, even though evidence suggests that US authorities have known where he was buried since 1947. “We are honoring the memory of Lt. Thorpe on behalf […]
WWI pursuit pilot and escaped POW Theose Tillinghast was one of the few Allied flying officers to escape from enemy hands during World War I. A Providence native, he attended Providence Technical High School before graduating from RI State College with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. Tillinghast joined Pratt and Whitney Aircraft when he resigned from […]
Dewey Turilli (1923- ) On February 23, 2023, former Army Air Forces radio operator Turilli celebrated his 100th birthday. He was on Iwo Jima in 1945 with the 457th Fighter Squadron. A talented woodcarver, he took over the family furniture business, and has been very involved with the Providence Vet Center Art Program in recent […]
So far we can document 15 Tuskegee Airmen from this state, three of whom died during their service: 2/LT William E. Hill of Narragansett Flight Officer William P. Armstrong of Providence 2/LT Walter S. Gladding of Providence The first black pilot from Rhode Island to graduate from the Tuskegee program was 2/LT William E. Hill […]
Military aviation has been a major part of Rhode Island’s history, starting with James and Ezra Allen, who flew observation balloons for the Union Army during the Civil War. Fixed wing involvement started when Gerald Hanley joined the Rhode Island National Guard in 1915. As a lieutenant in Battery A of the Coast Artillery, he […]
Richmond Viall (1896-1973) was born in Providence on June 26, 1896; his father was second-in-command at Brown & Sharpe Manufacturing Company when it was a global force in the machine tools business. He attended Williams College, but left in 1917 to join the British forces in Canada. He joined the Royal Canadian Flying Corps as […]
Chester Wachowicz (1923-2014) was born in Central Falls, RI. He left Cumberland High School in his junior year to help support his family. He joined the Civilian Conservation Corps, and when the war started he wanted to volunteer. After getting his father’s permission, he enlisted in the Army Air Corps and graduated from Aircraft Electrical […]
The Rhode Island Aviation Hall of Fame honored the four Rhode Island women who flew as WASP during World War II. These women are Phyllis Marsden Johnson Paradis, Bea St. Claire Smith Thurston, Ann Kenyon Morse, and Eunice Oates. The WASP program grew out of efforts led by noted aviatrix Jacqueline Cochran to integrate women […]
Charlestown resident Lawrence Webster is an award-winning mechanical engineer known in aviation history circles as the “aluminum undertaker” because of his extensive work excavating air crash sites.
Hugh Willoughby (1856-1939) Newport resident Hugh Willoughby was was an avid inventor, traveler, aviator, and sportsman. He built his first serious aircraft model in 1894, the same year he organized the Naval Reserve in Rhode Island (he graduated from the Naval War College in 1896). By 1900 he was a noted aerial photographer, taking pictures […]
Born in 1942, Wakefield native Rick Wilson earned the Silver Star, Distinguished Flying Cross, two Single Mission Air Medals, a Navy Commendation Medal and 46 mission Air Medals in Vietnam. He flew more than 900 missions in his 13 months of flying in-country, consisting primarily of recon insertions/extractions as well as medevac. He was 2nd […]