I was born poor in Moultrie in 1944, attended public schools, served in the U.S. Air Force, went to college, and lived and worked in Thomasville beginning in 1974, retiring from Thomas County Schools in 2002.

Those who now attempt to remove truth from our children’s textbooks and curriculum want to change our history and corrupt the real story of our past. These mean and misguided miscreants seek to foist their misbeliefs upon our young and force school systems to rewrite history. During the late and volatile 1960s and early 1970s, I studied history and earned a B.A. and M.A., focusing on America’s past, and I became immersed in the good and bad stories about how we became who we are today. We should not wipe the truth from textbooks and society, deny our heritage, and refill the gaps with lies.

We can’t allow our public schools to be plundered and misused by present day zealots and their followers who have no idea what the purpose of education is; simply, instead of allowing these extremists to rip the heart out of public education, let’s permit teachers to teach and precious minds to flourish and learn.

Grant Plymel

Thomasville, Ga.