Lafayette Lecture: Kiffin Rockwell & the Lafayette Escadrille

The Fall 2024 Lafayette Lecture will be held at 1pm on Friday, Sept. 6, in the Multi-Purpose Room in FTCC’s Tony Rand Student Center. Admission is free. The public is welcome.

The lecture will focus on Kiffin Rockwell and the Lafayette Escadrille, a French fighter squadron in the early days of World War I that was comprised mostly of volunteer pilots from the United States. In May 1916, Rockwell became the first American to shoot down an enemy aircraft. The Lafayette Escadrille was named for the Marquis de Lafayette, the French hero of the American Revolution (and the namesake of Fayetteville, NC, and many other US communities).

The lecture will be presented by Mark Trapp, author of “A Destiny of Undying Greatness: Kiffin Rockwell and the Boys Who Remembered Lafayette.”

The lecture will be held on the 267th anniversary of the Marquis de Lafayette’s birthday, celebrated each year by the Lafayette Society in Fayetteville. It is part of FTCC’s Community History Lecture Series and is presented in partnership with the Lafayette Society.