In June of 2026; I made my way back to Alabama this time to Birmingham, Alabama to speak at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
My invitation came through Secure Families Initiative , a national organization that works to ensure that military families, veterans, and those directly affected by military service have a voice in the civic and policy conversations that shape their lives.
They were bringing their “Still Here, Still Speaking” program to Alabama and creating something more meaningful than a traditional panel. It was designed as a listening space, a place where military-connected people could offer their lived experiences as testimony about service, democracy, civil rights, family, and belonging.
We were there because military service is often discussed through numbers, policies, deployments, and wars, while the voices of the people and families living through those experiences can be overlooked. Secure Families Initiative wanted to bring those voices forward and place them in conversation with advocates, elected officials, educators, historians, community leaders, and one another.
The invitation asked us, to tell the fuller story: not only why people serve, but what service asks of them; what their families carry; what challenges await them when they return home; and whether the nation they defended fully sees, supports, and includes them afterward.
That was why my story belonged there.
I was not invited solely because I had served in the Army. I was invited because my life carries several sides of the military-family experience. I am the daughter of a World War II veteran who served in a segregated colored unit on Utah Beach DDay+2 in Normandy. I am the birth daughter of a Vietnam-era service member who later made a career in the Marine Corps with over 20 years of service. I am a Black woman who served in the Army during the 1990s and also as Army wife of a soldier who served 20 years. I am also the mother of a soldier who deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan with the 101st Screaming Eagles as Air Assault at Fort Campbell.
My experience allowed me to speak not only as a veteran, but as someone who has lived with military service from nearly every position within a family.
And as a family historian, I understood the responsibility of preserving what every generation endured after the official military record ended.
The gathering was intended to connect personal testimony with the larger American story. It asked us to consider how military service intersects with race, gender, citizenship, opportunity, and the continuing effort to make democracy live up to its promises. My family’s four generations of first-borns gave that conversation a living timeline.
We were there to listen to one another, but we were also there to leave a record.
We were still here.
We were still serving our communities.
And we were still speaking about what military families have carried—before war, during war, and long after coming home.
After reflecting on this for a few weeks, sitting near Dr. Joe Reed made that message even more powerful. He, too, had served in the Army and returned to a segregated Alabama. He went on to become a major voice in education, civil rights, and political life. His presence reminded me that many Black veterans returned from defending freedom abroad and then continued the fight for citizenship and dignity here at home.
Birmingham was the right place for this conversation because its history holds both the pain of injustice and the courage of people who demanded that America live up to its promises. In a city shaped by the struggle for civil rights, we could speak honestly about military service, sacrifice, democracy, and the long journey toward full citizenship and belonging.
Thank you to Secure Families Initiative and all the expert Panelists in their own right.
Mel and Regina Mason
Community leaders whose work and experiences contributed to the conversation about service, justice, family, and civic participation.
Troy Mosley
Military-connected leadership and advocacy, adding a veteran or national-service perspective to the program.
Valencia Richardson
Civic-engagement and voting-rights expertise, helping connect personal testimony with democracy and access to political participation.
Kyle Bibby
Veteran and public advocate whose work connects military service, leadership, democracy, and the experiences of Black service members. Co-founder and Co-CEO of Black Veterans Project.
Scot Loyd
Veteran, educator, minister, or community storyteller contributing a personal and moral perspective on service, sacrifice, and belonging. He publicly described the Birmingham program as a civic space for military-family testimony and truth. He is the Oral Historian Manager at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, Illinois
Dr. Joe L. Reed Sr.
Army veteran, educator, civil-rights activist, longtime Alabama political leader, and father of Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed.
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