Maria A. Howell-Jenkins Wings of Color

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Go home, nigger. We do not want your kind here. All I heard was the word nigger every time I turned around. I was fighting for my place in this world and struggling for my freedom. No one was going to take either my dream or my career away from me. I am going to show Ozark Airlines I belong there and I can smile and do the same job as the white girls. I walked through the path of racism and prejudice, being the first black stewardess to fly for an airline in the Midwest in 1969, and circumstances has made it unbearable at times because of the color of my skin. As I listen to the hate words, it gave me the strength and the courage as a human being to go forward with my goals, yet there was a secret about me that allowed me to beat the odds and fulfill my dreams for thirty-three years as a flight attendant.