MANCHESTER – A new township playground was unveiled recently and during that warm afternoon you could find a lot of adults, three of which were public officials who had to try out the swings, just to make sure they were safe for children to use.
Mayor Joseph Hankins and council members James Vaccaro and Sandy Drake came out to Tuskegee Park for a ribbon cutting ceremony after the completion of a massive renovation project.
They joined members of the township’s Department of Public Works who performed the significant renovation which was funded through grants from the State Department of Community Affairs and the federal Community Development Block Grant program
The park was first dedicated in 2004 to honor the historic Tuskegee Airmen, a group of African-American aviators who served with distinction in World War II. It is the first township park named after a specific group of veterans.
A stone monument noting the history and military service of the Tuskegee Airmen is now present in the park which is located at the end of Richard Drive (Tuskegee Airmen Drive).
The renovated park also features playgrounds, basketball courts, a picnic area. and the new playground equipment is on a soft surface making it safer for children in the event of a fall.
The property is owned by the school district and can be found just past the Manchester Middle School on Route 571. It also features spring-mounted airplanes and playgrounds for different age groups.
The town funded the park in 2004. It started with some basketball courts and a tot lot. It later got more facets of the Tuskegee Airmen such as planes.
“It fell into disrepair and we said ‘we’re going to do it right this time,’” Manchester Director of Public Works Al Yodakis said. “The majority of the labor was done in house. The only thing that was contracted out was the play surface. Maintenance wise (the surface) ends up saving us a lot of headaches for the next 20 years.”
“This is actually porous; we have an underdrain system. If you go out into the grass there is a little grate and there is drain where water will filter through this. We have this at Summit Park and Bowker Field and it works incredibly well,” Yodakis added.
He added that the material cost was approximately “$250,000 for the playground equipment and the safety surface. We bought the concrete ourselves and it was a couple thousand dollars for the flag pole.”
“Everything looks fine,” Councilwoman Drake remarked. “It is really quite beautiful.”
“You did a great job,” Mayor Hankins told Yodakis and the members of his staff that were present.
Several members of the mayor’s Veterans Advisory Committee were present sporting their red polo shirts and caps for the dedication. John Holzer said the group was “happy to be here and support the rededication of this park. We can see it was initially built in 2004 but it is all cleaned up. It is important that we remember the things that these gentlemen did in the past for our military and the path they set for other people to follow.”
Ann Edwards, a resident of Richard Drive and an Army veteran, was present during the July 5, 2004 dedication ceremony and returned for the more recent event. She was presented with the original plaque by the mayor.
“For the longest time we didn’t have a park in this area and so I thought I’d go down to the municipality and see if we could get one and we had some great people to work with that made it happen,” Edwards said.
Edwards added, “It was a labor of love. We have spent hours up here. We painted the court itself in the colors of the Tuskegee Airmen and the logo in the middle. We had a flyover that day and we made it a community event and the kids participated. The upgrade is beautiful.”
Councilwoman Drake gave Edwards the ribbon from the day’s ceremony.
“The Tuskegee Airmen were so feared by the German Luftwaffe that they put a $30,000 bounty on their head for any redtail that was shot down during World War II,” the mayor said providing some history. The “Luftwaffe” refers to the German Air Force, which existed in two distinct eras the WWII-era Luftwaffe and the modern Luftwaffe of the Bundeswehr.
“On the days when we first opened the park, we had a lot of the Tuskegee Airmen actually here and one of them brought his grandson who was a pilot,” Edwards noted.
The Tuskegee Airmen broke racial barriers within the U.S. military and were part of the U.S. Army Air Corps and became a highly decorated group. The 332nd Fighter Group was renowned for its escort missions and their success contributed to the eventual desegregation of the U.S. armed forces in 1948.
Their combat missions included the 99th Pursuit Squadron which saw its first combat in June 1943 in North Africa. The 332nd Fighter Group, formed by combining the 99th with other squadrons, fought in the European theater and became one of the Army Air Force’s most successful escort groups.
The last Tuskegee Airmen to have flown combat missions in World War II was Lt. Col. George E. Hardy, who passed away in September at the age of 100.
