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AAHA Officers & Board of Directors

Officers

President
Karen Hughes White

Mrs. Karen Hughes White was born, raised, and now resides in Fauquier County, Virginia.  She is a descendant of free and enslaved African-Americans of Virginia dating to the early 1700s.  She is married to G. L. White, Jr. and together they have six children and ten grandchildren.  White graduated from the Hannah Harrison School of the YWCA with a diploma in Practical Nursing and licensed to work in Virginia and the District of Columbia.  A participant in the Getting Word Project sponsored by the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation and Africans in America produced by WGBS Boston, Massachusetts.  Nominated as an Every Day Hero by WBLA Channel 7, White has completed service on several county appointed boards and committees over the last ten years and was a Fauquier County Circuit Court Deputy Clerk.  She is currently serving on Monticello’s Burial Ground Committee, Fauquier County's 250th Anniversary Committee, and Project Advisor for The Power of Place: Understanding the African American Experience in the Journey through Hallowed Ground.  White is President of the Afro-American Historical Association of Fauquier County.


Vice President
Karen King Lavore
Karen King Lavore is a researcher and genealogist.  She is a descendant of early Fauquier and Roanoke County freed and enslaved African Americans dating to the early 1800s.  Co-founder of AAHA, co-author of Fauquier County Free Register of Negroes 1817-1865 and of the AAHAFC/s quarterly newsletter, Lavore is an Advisory Board Member of the African-American Genealogical Research Institute in Chicago, Illinois.  She attended Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, Ohio, and Temple Business College in Washington, D.C.  Retire from Pitney Bowes after 35 years of facilitating various administrative duties.  Current Officer (Historian) for the Virginia Beach Chapter of the National Council of Negro women. She is married to Louis Lavore, a retired Navy Seal.    

Tresurer
Lisa Elligant Tines
Lisa Elligant Tines is retired from the United States Navy after 20 years of service.  She is a graduate of Lord Fairfax Community College with an Associate’s Degree in Nursing.  She is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree from Old Dominion University.  She is employed at Fauquier Hospital.  She teaches First Aid and CPR for the Fauquier Chapter of The American Red Cross and volunteers at the Fauquier Free Clinic monthly.  She is married to Harold Tines, and has two children.

Secretary
Miriam Hall Porter, PhD.
Miriam Hall Porter is an Assistant Professor of Special Education with the Graduate School of Education and coordinator of Project SELF at George Mason University, Fairfax, VA.  She holds a B.S. From Hampton Institute, a M. Ed. from George Mason University, an M. Ed. from Virginia Tech, and a PhD. from Virginia Tech.  Porter currently operates CMR Educational Consulting specializing in working with children with special needs, learning disabilities, and emotional/behavioral disorders.  She is married to Conway Porter, and has three adult sons.

Board of Directors

Brett McAllister Tyler
Brett M. Tyler is a veteran of more than 30 years in the transportation industry.  A graduate of Morgan State University and the British Transport Staff College, he began his career with C&O/B&O Railroads (now CSX) in Baltimore, Maryland where he developed marketing plans to increase the railroad’s steel shipments. Currently, responsible for corporate and retail sales programs for the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA), Mr. Tyler’s responsibilities also include expanding transportation and non-transportation uses of WMATA’s SmarTrip® Card technology. Mr. Tyler was with the New York City Transit Authority and the National Railroad Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) prior to joining WMATA and was instrumental in the formulation of customer service, sales and marketing policies and programs at both organizations.  He also negotiated the agreement, which gave travel agents automated access to Amtrak’s train inventory through the airlines’ reservation systems. Married with one adult son, Mr. Tyler is active in his community including membership on the Board of Directors of the Conference of Minority Transportation Officials, The DC Chapter of Keep America Beautiful, the Afro-American Historical Association of Fauquier County, VA, and the Business Round Table of Montgomery County, MD.  He is also an active member of the American Passenger Transportation Association (APTA). A veteran researcher with over 30 years of genealogical research, including extensive research in Albemarle, Amherst, Fauquier and Orange Counties, Virginia, Mr. Tyler also serves as president of Heritage Associates, a firm that conducts genealogical research and informational seminars.

Angela Hughes Davidson
Angela received her undergraduate degree from Howard University and her M. A. in Counseling from the University of the District of Columbia.  Her work experience includes many years in health care delivery systems. In January, 2013, she retired from Kaiser Permanente.    In August 2013, she moved  from Washington DC. and returned to Marshall in  Fauquier County – where members of her family have lived for eight generations.  She is a member of the Board of Directors of AAHA and participates regularly in the organization’s activities.  In the past and for several years, Angela served as a volunteer teacher and board member for the Takoma Community and the NBC Lab schools in Washington, D.C., before and after school educational settings designed for children aged 3-12.   

Donna Tyler Hollie
A native Baltimorean, and a retired administrator with that city’s Department of Social Services, Dr. Donna Hollie is an Adjunct Professor at Sojourner-Douglass College.  She has researched her family history (the Blackwell’s, Chapman’s, Tyler’s, and Washington’s) for more than twenty-two years and has documented her Fauquier roots to approximately 1788.  As a result of her interest in genealogy, she returned to Morgan State University to formally study history and was awarded An M. A. in 1991 and Ph.D. in 2000.  She has contributed articles to a variety of historical and genealogical journals, has two entries in the Black Women in American: An Historical Encyclopedia and is currently researching for publication, “African American Women in Radio” and “A History of the African American Community of Sparrows Point, Maryland.”  With her brother, she is co-founder of HERITAGE ASSOCIATES, an association dedicated to the research, preservation, and celebration of African American history and culture.