There has been a lot in the news this past year about racism and hate crimes.

But to me, racism is the stupidest kind of stupidity there is. I just cannot fathom hating someone because of the color of their skin.

Maybe a little bit of it has to do with the way I was raised.

My first lesson in racism came when I was 4 or 5 years old.

My family was living in Alabama in the mid-1950s. My dad was stationed at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Ala., and we lived in on-base housing.

There was an African-American pilot who lived three doors down. His children and my older brother and I played together all the time and the pilot played with us.

One day, a racist officer came over and told my dad he shouldn’t allow this fighter pilot to play with his kids. The guy said the African-American shouldn’t be allowed to live in the on-base housing.

My dad let him have it. My dad said it was not his business who the kids played with. He said the fighter pilot had more rights to on-base housing than he did or my family because this guy was a commissioned officer and we were just reservists.

I also am embarrassed to say that before I moved to Richmond, I didn’t know anything about Maggie Walker or Oliver W. Hill Sr.

Unfortunately, I think that is true of probably the majority of people in this country.

In a place and time when women — never mind black women — did not go into business, Maggie Walker got tired of being mistreated by white bankers and opened her bank.

My favorite American hero is George Washington Carver. He was treated by society and the political system as less than a second class citizen, but he accomplished miracles.

KIRK HANCOCK

Richmond