The writer who wishes to smear another writer and proponent of the Tubman statue with the noxious taint of "political correctness" couldn't be more wrong ("Tubman statue: political correctness run amok," March 15). He believes John Hanson will be unfairly relegated because he was a white male and Tubman unreasonably elevated because she was not.

My academic experience, albeit a long time ago, was decidedly to the contrary. Although I excelled in history and got a academic prize for it along with a degree cum laude from Western Maryland College, I was somehow unaware of who Harriet Tubman was.

The full importance of her accomplishments was not brought home to me until I read a chapter of "Black Profiles In Courage" by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in a Cumberland bookstore in the 1990s. Before then I had no idea who she was or what she accomplished or even that she came from Maryland, a state where I have always lived and loved. How I did acquire the 120 magic credits to graduate an institution of higher learning with some distinction in the 1970s without knowing Harriet Tubman? Could it be because I am a white male and was taught history exclusively by white males?

In contrast I did know who John Hanson was.

Paul R. Schlitz Jr., Baltimore