Long Beach Latino Civic Association Helps 'Airman' Land At Cradle Of Aviation

GARDEN CITY, NY. — Long Islanders will have the chance to learn about the legacy of an American hero Thursday night, as the Cradle of Aviation museum partners with the Long Beach Latino Civic Association to screen “Airman: The Extraordinary Legacy of Tuskegee Airman, Calvin G. Moret.”

The film is the brainchild of Amy Serrano, an award-winning filmmaker, activist and author who spent the last three years of Moret’s life with him. On her website, Serrano called it, “the very timely story of one man’s love of country and humanity, even during unconscionable times.” According to Helen Dorado Alessi of the Long Beach Latino Civic Association, those three years brought Serrano so close to Moret that his own children joked that she knew him better than they did. To Serrano, the years spent as a documentarian and biographer of Moret went beyond the work.

“I never imagined that my life would intertwine with a Tuskegee Airman, or Tuskegee Airmen in general,” Serrano said in a video posted to her Facebook page. “As we moved through the three years of documenting Mr. Moret’s story, it became apparent that a special friendship was developing behind the scenes for us. So much so that, when I got married, I asked him to walk me down the aisle.”

Dorado Alessi said she met Serrano 25 years ago when they were both in the National Hispana Leadership Institute, a training program to help Latina women become leaders. 22 people were granted entry into the institute each year, taking part in a four-part training program with stops in San Baptista, CA, Harvard University and Washington, D.C.The women from the institute — known as “Leonas,” Spanish for “lionesses” — have stayed in touch over the past 20 years. From deaths to divorces and any number of issues in between, the sisterhood from the institute has stayed strong.

“Basically, it's a sisterhood. Why is it a sisterhood? Because to be a Hispanic woman leader is very lonely. You could be the only one in a radius of 100 miles in some parts of the country, and we're talking 20 some odd years ago, so it's not the same as today,” Dorado Alessi said. “Amy and I met there. Amy was already a filmmaker. Amy was already about to launch a very, very difficult film to even watch, to tell you the truth, called ‘Sugar Babies.’ And it talks about the slavery of children on the border of the Dominican Republic and Haiti. She’s a multi award winning director, filmmaker, photographer, writer, poet.”

In time, Dorado Alessi came to serve on the board of a nonprofit Serrano started, called the One Better World Project. The organization lists its mission as, “to inspire a better world through the production and diffusion of transformative multimedia art and social impact initiatives.”

Among those initiatives, Dorado Alessi said, is “Airman,” a film she felt needed to be under the foundation’s banner as soon as she heard the concept for it. When asked what she hopes viewers take away from Thursday night’s screening, Dorado Alessi said it could serve as a reminder of how important it is to preserve history.

“I want them to understand that our knowledge, the true knowledge about history, is on the line. Back and February, there is a training module that included the [Tuskegee] airmen, and they erased that training module,” Dorado Alessi said, referring to the removal of a training manual that featured the Tuskegee Airmen from Air Force curriculum. “The sense that our history can be erased is real, and we should all be the keeper of our histories. We are all responsible for making sure that truth is available to all.”

For Serrano, the chance to screen “Airman” is a chance to remember the man who walked her down the aisle, a man she misses every day.

“I miss Mr. Moret incredibly, and when faced with certain challenges, I often ask myself, what would Mr. Moret do?’” Serrano said. “For, despite the indignations of his experiences in the Jim Crowe south, and his willingness to talk about them, Mr. Moret was a kind, fair, loving man, and believed in a better world.”

The screening will begin at 6 p.m. with a Q&A session to follow. Attendance is free, but registration is required. Registration can be completed by emailing contact@onebetterworldproject.org.