“I am proud to be the daughter of Colonel Lawrence E. Roberts,” Roberts told The Root, her pride seeming to burst through the phone. “I think about him daily. I blow a kiss to my mother and father every time I step into the studio at GMA and I know that they’re cheering me on from their heavenly balcony. My father taught me the three Ds. He taught me discipline, determination, and about ‘Da Lord.”

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The Roberts Family
The Roberts Family
Photo: Courtesy of Robin Roberts/The History Channel

“As a young boy growing up in New Jersey, he would take a broomstick handle and pretend it was his throttle and that he was flying,” Roberts recalled. “This was a time where Black people didn’t have [many] rights in this country. [It wasn’t] his family, but others were like, ‘Come on, man, you’re not going to ever fly a plane.’”

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Still, his perseverance and passion persisted. That same tenacity carried the elder Roberts through his grueling pilot training and the many bouts of outright racism and microaggressions in between.

“He told me, ‘I never felt more free than when I was in the air,’” Roberts noted. “ [He said] ‘I felt more freedom in the air than I did on the ground as a Black man.’”

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Being intimately familiar with that sort of persistence and tenacity—plus, a well-known phrase Roberts and I both agree on, Barack Obama’s “audacity of hope”—carried Roberts throughout her own journey.

“Initially, when I got into broadcasting, I wanted to be a sports reporter and anchor, and there were no women there[...], there were no Black women doing it,” Roberts recalled. “And I thought, my daddy had the nerve to dream about being a pilot. So, I’m like, I’m going to be scurred, but I want to be a sports reporter?! Come on, Robin!”

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Colonel Lawrence E. Roberts
Colonel Lawrence E. Roberts
Photo: Courtesy of Robin Roberts/The History Channel

Roberts notes how her father’s legacy lives on in the special, citing significant figures and leaders such as Lt. Col. Shawna Rochelle Kimbrell, who became the first African American female combat fighter pilot and the current superintendent of the U.S. Air Force Academy, “a Black man!,” she exclaims—Lt. Gen. Richard M. Clark. As Roberts notes, Tuskegee Airmen: Legacy of Courage will air on “the premiere destination for historical storytelling” and she hopes audiences see the connection between the Tuskegee Airmen, the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement uprisings.

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Though the upcoming special will focus on race relations, Roberts did comment on the historical relevance that the Tuskegee experiment has on today as Black people navigate the novel era of the COVID-19 vaccine. “That is very important. [...] I have thought about that and when I’ve talked at GMA, I’ve made that connection between the Tuskegee experiment and what we’re going through—the fear that people have today.”

Overall, Roberts hopes the documentary special will educate viewers as well instill some sense of optimism and pride.

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“[My father] was still as patriotic [and] loved this country at a time that it didn’t love him back, [yet] it didn’t prevent him from throwing back his shoulders, keeping his head up high and persevering,” Roberts concluded. “When I think about the double victory that the airmen and my father [won] fighting overseas as they did and then fighting racism at home, it remains an important lesson in how excellence can beat adversity, including Black excellence.”

Tuskegee Airmen: Legacy of Courage
Tuskegee Airmen: Legacy of Courage
Photo: Courtesy of The History Channel
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Tuskegee Airmen: Legacy of Courage airs Feb. 10 at 8 p.m. ET on The History Channel.