By Staff
Carolyn Owens
Carolyn Owens has been a part of the Navy for 14 years, the past six months as executive officer of the Navy Technical Training Center at Naval Air Station Meridian.
Owens, 34, said her grandfather has made the biggest impact in her life. The United States Marine Corps was the last armed force to allow black men into the service in 1941. She said the trials he faced paved the way for her own military career.
Owens said "no ship wanted to carry African Americans overseas because they said they would bring bad luck. A foreign ship carried them over."
Before leaving Philadelphia, Pa. for her first base in 1988, her grandfather met her at the airport to give her his uniform. Her grandfather inspires her to further her commitment to the military.
Independence Day is more than just patriotism to Owens  it's a way of life.
Black females Lillian E. Fishburne and Michelle Howard have also had an impact in Owen's life. Fishburne became the first black female rear admiral while Howard was the first to command a ship. Owens said they set the groundwork for black females in the Navy.
Owens has a 1-year-old son, DeJuan.
Alvin Wilkinson
Alvin Wilkinson of Meridian knows what hardship is and what you sometimes have to sacrifice to preserve freedom.
Wilkinson, 63, was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1961, just before the Cuban Missile crisis in 1962. From 1961-1963, he was assigned to the 82nd Artillery in Swinford, Germany.
Before he left, Wilkinson and his wife sold everything including their car and furniture. And after he saved enough money, Wilkinson flew his wife to Germany to join him.
Things weren't that much better in Germany. Tension between the Soviet Union and the United States had been growing tense; in Germany, military personnel were preparing for the worst.
Wilkinson was trained to fire a 280 mm "Atomic Annie," a weapon developed in the 1950s to fire atomic shells.
When Wilkinson returned to the United States from Germany, he said, he took a job working for $1.25 an hour.
The former truck driver and farmer said that freedom gives a person access to information and allows people to go where they want to go and do what they want to do.