About the Author . . . Henry Vanderbilt Johnson, Jr. I grew up on the Outer Banks, North Carolina (Manteo) and Hyde County. He is the middle child with four other siblings. His father served the in the United States army for twenty-one years. While his father was away, Johnson was compelled to play the role of "great protector" of the household. He utterly hated elementary school due ongoing encounters with bullies and indifferent teachers. He described classroom settings as incarcerated learning environments. Johnson viewed teachers as security guards and principals as wardens. Johnson describes his elementary and middle school experiences as tortuous and dehumanizing. He began school at the older age of seven instead of six. He spent two years in the first grade and tolerated ridicule and bullying each day from students who didn't like him. After being retained in the first grade, Johnson experienced another setback during his sophomore year of high school when the black community of his school district elected to stage a boycott in protest of a plan to close all black schools within the county. As such, he was nearly twenty-one years old before graduating high school. Due to the fact that his father was in the military, Johnson traveled extensively. He lived in France, Germany, Fairfax, Virginia, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and a host of other small towns and cities. He describes Kronicles of a Kolored Kid as a paper trail of his experiences growing up as a poor black male in eastern North Carolina. He shares a host of stories about the internal dynamics of the black community, social class systems, rites of passage, encounters with the Ku Klux Klan, friendships, betrayals, and death. He contends that his chronicle will compel you to laugh out loud and shed tears of sorrow. Johnson received a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from Virginia Tech, a (CAGS) Certificate of Advanced Graduate Studies from Virginia Tech, an Education Specialist Degree from East Carolina University, a Master's Degree in Educational Leadership from North Carolina A & T State University, a Master's Degree in Middle School Education and Reading from North Carolina A & T State University, and Bachelor of Science Degree in Intermediate Education from Elizabeth City State University. He is currently employed as an Associate Professor and Coordinator of Middle Grades and Secondary Education at Elizabeth City State University, Elizabeth City, North Carolina.