Born about the time the Tuskegee Airmen were earning their reputation over the skies of North Africa and Italy, Marcelite Harris would go on to break a number of racial and gender barriers during an illustrious Air Force career.

Harris was born Jan. 16, 1943, in Houston and attended Spelman College in Atlanta, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in speech and drama in 1964. She then attended Officer Training School at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, where she was commissioned a second lieutenant in 1965.

During the early days of her career, Harris held assignments as an administrative officer in California and West Germany, before transitioning into the maintenance field by attending the aircraft maintenance officer’s course at Chanute Air Force Base, Ill., and graduating as the first female aircraft maintenance officer.

Her first assignment as a maintenance officer was to support the Vietnam War as a maintenance supervisor with the 49th Tactical Fighter Squadron in Korat Royal Thai air base, Thailand. After stints back in California and Washington, D.C., Harris broke another barrier as one of the first women to be an air officer commanding at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo.

After commanding an avionics maintenance squadron and a field maintenance squadron, both in Kansas, and a director of maintenance in Okinawa, Japan, Harris would make another first – this time as the first woman deputy commander for maintenance.

But her biggest accomplishment lay ahead, when in 1991, Harris became the first female African-American general, when she pinned on her first star as the vice commander of the Oklahoma Center Air Logistics Center.

Harris retired from the Air Force in early 1997, where she had been serving as the director of maintenance, deputy chief of staff for logistics, Headquarters, U.S. Air Force. At that time, she was the highest ranking female officer in the Air Force and the highest ranking African-American female within the Department of Defense.

Harris continues to contribute to the Air Force even after her retirement. In 2010, President Barack Obama appointed her a member of the Board of Visitors for the United States Air Force Academy. As a board member, she inquiries into the morale, discipline, curriculum and other matters deemed appropriate. The board submits reports to the secretary of defense and the Committees on Armed Services of the Senate and Congress via the secretary of the Air Force.

As she continues to serve the Air Force she serves her community. She is a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. For her works, in 2010 she was nationally recognized by the Black Girls Rock Foundation with the Trailblazer Award.

President Barack Obama has a new, moneyed supporter in this new year — a super PAC dedicated to mobilizing black voters in key swing states.

Calling itself 1911 United, the super PAC is aiming to raise $1.5 million during the election cycle and train its efforts on Colorado, Florida, Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia, committee treasurer Sinclair Skinner told POLITICO.

“He needs a boost,” Skinner said of Obama. “And we want to use all the means possible to support him, including a super PAC. Black political participation is still evolving, and what we hope to do is get as many voters active in the process as early as possible.”

The committee is backed by two large, historically black fraternities, Kappa Alpha Psi and Omega Psi Phi, both of which celebrated their centennials last year.

The 1911 United super PAC will likely work to “organize and deploy” black voters — particularly potential first-time voters — in support of Obama, said Skinner, a long-time Washington, D.C.-based political organizer who’s a mechanical engineer by trade. He notes that the group intends to make significant use of phone banking and social media to achieve this goal.

Broadcast media messages are a possibility, but “we’re really going to focus on working with the people directly,” he said.

Super PACs, formally known as independent expenditure-only committees, may raise and spend unlimited sums of money in support of, or in opposition to political candidates, so long as they don’t directly coordinate with campaigns.

These committees have become major forces in the 2012 presidential election, with numerous super PACs spending millions of dollars to promote and attack Republican presidential candidates in early caucus and primary states such as Iowa and New Hampshire. Many of them are run by the presidential candidates’ former staffers, and thanks to loopholes in election law, they’ve largely avoided disclosing their funders ahead of early primary and caucus contests.

This is the first presidential election in which super PACs have existed. They sprung into existence following a pair of 2010 federal court decisions, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission, which prompted their legality.

To date, Priorities USA Action, run by a pair of Obama’s former White House aides, is the largest super PAC to back the president during his re-election bid. Almost all of its more than $306,000 in expenditures so far this election cycle have gone toward attacking Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Texas police on Friday released a composite sketch of a man they believe broke into the homes of four former members of the same sorority, then sexually assaulted them.

No name has been given for the suspect in the alleged break-ins and attacks, which took place between November 2010 and October 2011, according to a timeline from the Plano police.

Detectives, however, do have “a definite DNA profile on the suspect” after a crime lab report, the police statement noted.

Plano police in October released a video — dated in April — showing a man with a distinctive swagger who they believe is responsible. Snapshots from that video were distributed Friday.

The alleged assaults occurred in the cities of Plano, Coppell and Corinth, all suburbs of Dallas.

The alleged victims — all females in their mid-50s to mid-60s — were alumnae of the same predominantly African-American sorority: Delta Sigma Theta, according to police.

They offered similar descriptions of their assailant as being a black male in his late 30s to mid-40s, weighing from 275 to 300 pounds and standing between 5 feet 7 inches and 5 feet 9 inches tall.

“He made it obvious to our victims that he knew information … about them personally,” Plano police spokesman Andre Smith said this fall, adding that none of the women believe they knew their attacker in advance.

According to Corinth Police Capt. Greg Wilkerson, all the assaults occurred in “residential settings” between 9:15 p.m. and 4 a.m. when the victims were alone. The alleged attack in his city, 35 miles northwest of Dallas, took place on October 14.

The late-night setting, the fact the victims were often asleep and the alleged assailant’s “attempts to conceal his identity” make it challenging to definitively identify the attacker, said Wilkerson.

Wilkerson said that the nature of the assaults suggest the alleged assailant was “possibly suspecting surveillance, spending some time around the areas … prior to the attacks.”

The police captain said authorities do not know how the suspect learned details of the victims, speculating it may have been over the internet, by accessing an old directory or noticing would-be victims with Delta Sigma Theta jewelry, placards or other paraphernalia out in public.

Delta Sigma Theta’s President Cynthia M.A. Butler-McIntyre this fall issued a statement urging members in the Dallas area to take precautions.

“To think that our members are being targeted is disturbing and extremely disheartening,” she said.

The-CNN-Wire/Atlanta/+1-404-827-WIRE(9473)

Cheers erupted when a young man walked into the Expo Room at the Holiday Inn Bordeaux & Convention Center on election night. Necks craned as the crowd watching the results come in turned to see who was demanding so much attention.

Many of them didn’t recognize the lean, immaculately dressed man with the boyish grin. Most had expected the fuss to be over Fayetteville’s mayor, Tony Chavonne.

But this was another mayor – newly crowned Chris Rey, a 34-year-old former Army captain and law school graduate who came home to Spring Lake and ran a yearlong, nationally styled campaign that swept aside longtime Mayor Ethel Clark with 76 percent of the vote.

“I thought, ‘Well, that’s like President Obama just walked into the room,’ ” said Lexi Hasapis. “Everybody was so excited. I’m pretty sure that, had the mayor of Fayetteville been there, he would have been a little jealous.”

Rey has energy, enthusiasm and bold aims: Regional transportation, citizen involvement, youth programs, cultivating the next generation of town leaders. But he also swayed voters with specific plans for accomplishing his goals.

“This is what we’re trying to do, and this is how we’re going to make it happen,” he said, “as opposed to it being a big pie in the sky, and you can’t reach the pie.”

Spring Lake’s 5,400 voters had never seen a campaign like this, with its early start and glossy website. Nor have they had a mayor with his own chief of staff. But Rey thinks big.

“If Spring Lake is going to be the town that everyone keeps on talking about for its potential, then the mind-set of how we govern has to change, as well,” he said. “We have to do it a little bit differently.”

Chris Rey was born on St. Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands. His grandmother moved with him to Spring Lake when he was 9 to join his uncle, a signal officer stationed at Fort Bragg. They lived in a modest, two-bedroom home on Laura Court.

“You always knew Chris was going to be something, right from junior high,” said Shanin Cole, who was in a chorus class with Rey in seventh grade. “He was all over the place. Everybody knew Chris Rey.”

An All-American sprinter at Pine Forest High School, Rey went to East Carolina University in 1995 on a track scholarship to study business. His political awakening began there, in Greenville, where he started an NAACP chapter and got active within the Phi Beta Sigma fraternity.

But Rey left college during his senior year to enlist in the Army in 1999 to help support his family. He spent seven years there, including deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Rey left the Army in 2007 as a signal officer, a captain, commander of the 3rd Special Forces Signal Detachment.

After completing his business degree at Walden University, Rey enrolled in law school at The College of William & Mary in Virginia. While waiting to start classes, he interned on Capitol Hill for U.S. Rep. John Lewis, the former civil rights activist he had met at a fraternity conference.

Lewis said he turns down hundreds of requests to appear for candidates every year, but he came to Spring Lake twice to stump for Rey.

“I saw something in him as a young leader,” Lewis said. “He had this unbelievable sense of hope and optimism and a can-do attitude – this very warm and outgoing spirit that he can do it, he can succeed.”

Having Lewis appear on his behalf got a lot of attention.

“It is rare for someone of the quality of John Lewis to come to town to campaign for anyone,” said Dr. Thomas Hennessey, an associate professor at the Department of Government and History at Fayetteville State University. Hennessey said Rey broke one of the natural laws of local politics.

“Usually you’ve got to run once and lose once before you win,” he said.

The seeds of Rey’s campaign were sowed at law school, where he helped out on local and congressional races and was appointed to Virginia’s electoral college for the 2008 presidential election.

Rey later decided to run for state House in Virginia but changed his mind because “it didn’t feel right.”

Instead, after graduating in 2010, he found his political future back home. On a weekend visit in early 2010, Rey ran into a childhood friend who had since been in prison, a convicted felon who wanted to better himself but saw no way to do it in Spring Lake.

“I don’t know what about that conversation really just moved me,” Rey said, “but I was like, if someone like me can come back here and create some better opportunities, I need to really think about it.”

That and other, similar observations prompted Rey to tell his family that he was moving back home and running for mayor. He had offers from friends and firms in big cities, but his path was set.

“I just felt like Spring Lake was where I needed to come,” he said.

Some of Rey’s words can’t help but seem arrogant. He’s not, but neither is he humble; just matter-of-fact.

“I could have taken everything that I’ve had and made a whole lot of money,” he said. “I really could’ve. But I just know there are people out there that need help, and in this little bit of time that I have here on earth, I might as well do it.”

Rey put together a volunteer team of friends, set up a website and began spreading the word of his candidacy almost a year before the election.

“I wanted them to realize that I wasn’t some fly-by-night guy, that I was serious,” he said.

A “duct tape and yarn” campaign was never going to be enough, Rey said, because it was all that voters had to judge him on, against his opponent’s three decades of service.

“I was running against a 30-year incumbent, and I did not take that lightly,” Rey said. Clark was on the board of aldermen for 20 years before she became mayor. “I don’t care what issues this town has had; for 30 years they have chosen to re-elect her,” Rey said. “She got up, and she served the people, and I respected that.”

Clark said she asked Rey to run for alderman, to let her be his mentor. He turned her down. Rey said his experience in leadership, budgets and resource management in the Army was ample preparation.

“The military trains especially its officers to handle a lot more than people give us credit for,” he said.

Rey raised more than $16,000 during the campaign, according to reports filed with the county board of elections. No one there could remember that much ever being spent in Spring Lake. The $3,763.37 Rey’s campaign spent in the last month of the race was more than Clark’s campaign paid out all year.

Both candidates’ coffers were filled with small individual donations. Many of Rey’s came from out of town. But while that’s often a tip-off that carpetbaggers are looking to influence town policy, these were donations from places – Texas, Maryland, Virginia – with no apparent interest in Spring Lake affairs. They were from people Rey had worked for and studied with, who made small donations through his website.

“People respond to him in a way that you don’t typically respond to politicians,” said Hasapis, who met Rey when they were at East Carolina University together. Her family expected about 50 people when they hosted a fundraiser for Rey at the Country Fish Fry in Spring Lake.

“We ended up feeding almost 200,” Hasapis said. “It was so interesting to see what he has ignited in people.”

Rey crisscrossed town all year.

“He came in, and he spoke real confidently about what he was trying to do,” said Clarence Richmond, who runs Moon’s Barber Shop. The shop sits near several empty storefronts on Main Street and has a large Chris Rey campaign poster on the wall.

“I think he’s a good guy,” Richmond said. “I hope he can do a lot for the city.”

The election was embarrassingly one-sided. Rey won by 648 votes to 203. A week later, Clark remained “baffled” at how she’d lost.

“I’m still trying to figure that out,” she said. “They want change, but I don’t understand what they want change to.”

Rey thinks people simply didn’t feel involved in the town.

“I knew that if I at least take the campaign to them, it will force them to at least consider it,” he said.

Rey telecommutes as a strategic planner and policy director for the Virginia National Guard. He also runs a consulting firm helping nonprofits and businesses navigate the paperwork involved in setting up shop. He plans to work out of the mayor’s office as much as possible to make himself more accessible.

He admits he won’t lead the town for 30 years but gets offended at speculation that he’ll aim for higher office after one term.

“This wasn’t a game for me, not a notch in my belt,” he said. “I really believe that this is where I’m supposed to be and this is what I’m supposed to be doing.”

It never crossed Brett “Monty” Ellington’s mind when he entered the U. S. Army more than two decades ago what he could accomplish.

“I never expected to stay in as long as I did, but I never doubted that I couldn’t do it,” Ellington said.

The 45-year-old, who grew up in Alton, recently joined the ranks of the enlisted elite when he became one of the branch’s top non-commissioned officers. The highly decorated soldier earned the rank of sergeant major and now is in the top 1 percent of the Army’s enlisted personnel.

Ellington graduated from the United States Army Sergeant Major Academy on June 15 at Fort Bliss, Texas, and is headed to Fort Riley, Kan.

Ellington has come a long way since he put on his first pair of combat boots in 1985. Four months after graduating from Alton High School, he stepped into basic training at Fort Sill, Okla.

Following basic, Ellington remained at Fort Sill to attend AIT, or advanced individual training, where he would earn his military occupation specialty as a 13B, also known as a field artillery cannon crew member.

After completing his training, Ellington was sent to his first duty station at Fort Carson, Colo. After that, he was sent to South Korea, where he earned his first set of “stripes” as a non-commissioned officer.

“I’ve been wearing stripes ever since,” he said.

Ellington returned stateside to Fort Benning, Ga., where he attended the Non-commissioned Officer’s Academy and then was promoted to sergeant.

“I worked in a supervisor position as a section chief,” he said.

After serving as a leader for a few years, Ellington decided he wanted to train those entering the service, as well. He attended Drill Sergeant School and then headed back to Fort Sill, where he trained new recruits.

“While I was on drill sergeant status, I was promoted to sergeant first class,” he said.

Upon leaving Fort Sill for the second time, Ellington headed to Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, where he took on a new leadership role. From there, he went back to Korea and then returned to Hawaii.

During most of Ellington’s military career he has been at Oklahoma, Colorado, Georgia, South Korea and Hawaii.

It was during his second tour at Schofield Barracks that he took over the position of command sergeant major of the 3rd Battalion, 7th Field Artillery Regiment for about nine months before helping to deploy the unit to Iraq.

It was for his bravery, heroism or meritorious service while in Iraq that he earned a Bronze Star Medal. Ellington also holds four Meritorious Service Medals and two Army Commendation Medals, as well as other awards and honors.

The Army is a way of life, but Ellington said his family is just as important. He said even though his marriage to his first wife ended, he remains close with his children, Brandon, 21, and Briaunna, 18, who live in Colorado.

Ellington married for a second time six years ago.

“What’s great is we’ve known each other since childhood,” he said.

He said although he and his wife, Shirley (James) Ellington, knew each other, they hadn’t seen each other until he contacted her after he found out that she was stationed with her U.S. Navy Reserve Unit at Pearl Harbor.

The two connected and began hanging out, attending church, and the relationship blossomed. The couple married two years later.

The couple dated for two years before getting married.

Ellington often returns to Alton to visit with family. His parents, Carl and Yvonne Ellington, still live in town, as do most of his siblings: Tina Stewart, Patricia McSwyne, Nicky McSwyne, Darrylyn McSwyne, Robert Beamon and Cameron Ellington.

“I have two nephews that have followed in my footsteps and enlisted in the Army, as well,” he said.

He said both Marlon McSwyne and Devon Perry are staff sergeants.

Besides Army school and life, Ellington earned an associate’s degree from Excelsior College and is working toward his bachelor’s degree. He is a member of the Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity and proudly lives by its motto, “Culture for Service and Service for Humanity.”

Both Ellington and his wife believe in helping others.

Shirley Ellington said the duo likes to assist young people.

“We have a mentoring program that helps out the children of parents who get sent overseas,” she said. “We work strictly with military children. We know that when a parent leaves, they may need someone to talk to or someone to listen.”

She said because children don’t chose to be military, they often undergo various problems or simply may need questions answered, and she and her husband are there to lend an ear.

“This is a way for both of us to give back,” she said. “We both believe in community service and reaching out to help others.”

After spending the past nine months at the Sergeant Major Academy, Monty Ellington said he is looking forward to arriving this week at Fort Riley.

He said following all his training as an advanced non-commissioned officer, he’s ready to serve in his new position on post as a fire support operations sergeant major.

He also is on the selection list to become a command sergeant major.

“I’m ready to start my next journey with the Army,” he said. “We both are. This will be my last tour of duty before I retire.”

cellis@thetelegraph.com

Wiley College, in Marshall, TX, honored Alpha Kappa Alpha Gloria J. Browne-Marshall with the 2011 Woman of Excellence in Law award. AKA Soror Gloria J. Browne-Marshall is a Professor of Constitutional Law at John Jay College in New York City, author of the best-selling book ”Race, Law, and American Society: 1607 to Present” and “The U.S. Constitution: An African-American Context,” a playwright, and former Civil Rights Attorney for the NAACP and Southern Poverty Law Center.

The National Veterans Coalition recently launched a fundraising initiative to fund a bronze monument of famous Buffalo Soldier Col. Charles Young that will be erected in Washington, DC.

When completed, the bronze statue will be the first in the nation to showcase a black military officer on a horse. An excellent equestrian, Col. Young was the highest ranking African American in all of the U.S. military at the time of his death in 1922; he was denied a promotion because of his race

“We are pleased to have viable, bi-partisan legislation that will honor Col. Young with Brigadier General status,” said Charles Blatcher, III, chairman and chief executive of the national group. “Now we are focusing our energies on funding the cost of the project.”

One aspect of the million-dollar capital campaign is a Black History Poetry Poster series featuring tributes to American heroes Crispus Attacks, Frederick Douglass and Col. Charles Young. The set of four posters retails for $55.

Corporate donors who meet financial criteria will receive a limited edition miniature bronze replica of the monument. All donations are tax deductible.

The Veteran’s Coalition has commissioned renowned sculptor Antonio Tobias Mendez to create the life-sized statue of Col. Young. Mendez is recognized for producing the bust of Thurgood Marshall at the BWI Airport named in his honor in Baltimore and the statue of Danny Thomas at St. Jude Hospital and Medical Center in Memphis, TN.

The group has agreed in principle to house the monument at the University of the District of Columbia. The Coalition is also proposing to establish a $500,000 scholarship for disadvantaged students.

Bi-partisan support of Col. Young’s honorary promotion demonstrates his rightful place in American history, Blatcher said. “It’s time for us to redress a time period that wasn’t kind to minorities in the military.”

Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) reintroduced the center piece of the Col. Young legislative package that grants him an honorary promotion to the rank of Brigadier General.

A strong supporter of the Coalition’s efforts, Congresswoman Jackie Speier (D-CA) is sponsoring a bill that seeks National Trail Status for the route traveled by Col. Young and the Buffalo Soldiers when they served as stewards of Sequoia National Park.

Congressman Geoff Davis (R-KY) has come aboard as co-sponsor of the legislation to give an honorary promotion to Col. Young. He also supports state efforts to designate Col. Young’s birthplace as a landmark.

Congressmen Wm. Lacy Clay (D-MO) and Steven Austria (R-Ohio) have jointly proposed a law that grants National Landmark status to Col. Young’s adult home in Xenia, OH, allowing the National Park Service to manage and preserve it.

This cooperative effort also includes support from the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. and the NAACP. Both groups have previously honored Col. Young for his many achievements.

In 1912, the Omegas selected him as the second honorary member in the fraternity’s history. This year the storied, international brotherhood will celebrate its 100th anniversary.

The NAACP presented Col. Young with the Spingarn Award in 1916 for his exceptional work in Liberia. The Civil Rights group annually awards the Spingarn Medal for outstanding achievement by a black American.

For media inquiries and interviews call Brigitte Maxey at (313) 676-0373 or e-mail brigitte.maxey@gmail.com. For photos go to www.colonelcyoung.org/Photo.htm

Ashley J. Johnson will announce his candidacy for Hartford’s Court of Common Council on Thursday, March 31, 2011. The event will take place at the Sportsmen’s Athletic Club located on 2976 Main Street, Hartford, CT 06120, from 6:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.

Johnson, a strong believer in the great city of Hartford, has said that he would like to “Put the “HEART” back into Hartford”, words that reflect the platform for his campaign. Johnson is seeking to explore new job opportunities for Hartford residents, as well as, to tackle the crime and violence that has plagued the city. He also seeks to find solutions to change the environment of some sections of Hartford, in an effort to attract more businesses into the communities and also to retain the city’s high school and college graduates through better college and employment incentives.

A.J. Johnson has been a strong advocate of supporting the community throughout his entire career, choosing a path that has kept him in active in the fight for change. He is currently working as a Community Integration Specialist for Community Health Development.  Johnson is the Vice Chair of the Northeast Revitalization Zone. He has also served as local Chapter Director, of the Service for Peace in Washington D.C., developing and fostering key partnerships with community based organizations, corporate and business community, schools, government and faith-based groups, engaging them in diverse programs and various projects throughout the community.

A graduate of  the W.L. Bonner College in Colombia, South Carolina, with a Bachelors of Religious Studies/Education, Johnson is also pursuing his the Masters of the Arts degree, in Organizational Management & Leadership from Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. Ashley J. Johnson is an ordained elder of the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ and a member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity Inc.

Johnson has stated, “I feel optimistic about the future of Hartford,CT. It is time for more innovative ideas, time for people in this the city to start working together in order to make the vision of a better Hartford into a reality.”

For more information please contact Ashley J. Johnson at 860-205-1280 orAJforcitycouncil@gmail.com