Blacks’ struggle not over, retired DOD official tells Stuttgart audience

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Claiborne Douglass Haughton Jr. shares his history during a Black History Month presentation Wednesday at Kelly Barracks in Stuttgart, Germany.


Blacks’ struggle not over, retired DOD official tells Stuttgart audience
By John Vandiver, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Friday, February 27, 2009

STUTTGART, Germany — The odds weren’t in Claiborne Douglass Haughton Jr.’s favor.

Raised in a rural part of segregated Louisiana, Haughton had more than racial discrimination to overcome as a youngster. Born with cerebral palsy, blind in one eye, wearing leg braces and calling an orphanage home for 12 years, there was plenty else to battle.

"Because I was blind in one eye and couldn’t see out the other, I wore Coke-bottle glasses that were so thick that when I looked at a map I could see people. ..." Haughton joked as he recalled his awkward appearance for an audience at Stuttgart’s Kelley Barracks Theater.

Despite those challenges, during a 35-year career with the Defense Department, Haughton climbed to a civilian rating equivalent to a military general. He credited childhood mentors who early on showed him the value of education and set him on the right path.

"We must never forget where we came from" and give something back, Haughton explained during Wednesday’s Black History Month event. "You must reach back and pull up those E-1s, 2s, and 3s."


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=61008