First Lt. Charles Richard Stanton was the first black bomber pilot in the U.S. Armed Forces—he flew 81 combat missions in Europe during WWII. He was born in Maryland in 1920, but had moved with this family to Portland by the 1930s. He enlisted in 1942 into the Air Corps for the duration of the war, plus six months. He died in 1991, and is buried at the Willamette National Cemetery in Portland.