Emmitt Jolly, an associate professor of biology at Case Western Reserve University, grew up in Alabama, just 20 miles from Tuskegee University. As a teenager, he worked at a farm in sweltering heat and, when that work ended, cleaned bathrooms and bussed tables at a local truck stop.

Jolly’s fortunes suddenly reversed when his high school counselor recognized his aptitude for science and introduced him to a professor of biology at Tuskegee University.

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