From Fear to Understanding

Springfield, Missouri's News-Leader ran an award winning essay "From Fear to Understanding" by Jordan Johnson to mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day yesterday.

Jordan (shown here) is a student at Pipkin Middle School and was the first-place winner in an essay contest sponsored by the local chapter of the NAACP.

His essay was about his grandmother and read in part...

"My grandmother was a US Postal worker. She was the first African American female to work for the Postal Service in a full time position. She was hired after a long Equal Employment complaint.

"On my grandma's first day at the post office no one talked to her. Everyone just observed her presence. Note the fact that she was the only African American there. She hadn't worked seven days before people damaged her car. Someone scratched crosses on her hood, knocked her side mirrors off, and put sticks in her gas tank. These people never communicated with my grandma so they hated her. After this incident all of my family told my grandma to leave this job. My grandma told them 'Nothing ever changes if you run away from the problem.' Until my grandma retired she never left the postal service."

To read Jordan's entire essay, click here.