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Kentucky teen takes to the skies after earning pilot’s license at 17

By CNN

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    MADISON COUNTY, Kentucky (WLEX) — Teenage freedom typically looks like earning a driver’s license and exploring newfound freedom on the roads. One Madison County teen is spreading his wings – in a more literal sense – by taking to the skies with a pilot’s license.

17-year-old Gaige Neely has his driver’s license and his private pilot’s license.

“17 is the earliest you can get your private pilot’s license,” he said. “The goal was to take the check ride when I was 17. I took mine about a month after my birthday.

Neely started taking online courses when he was 15. He soloed on his 16th birthday, just before getting his driver’s license. Which one was easier?

“Driver’s license 100%,” Neely said.

“I think he drives well, but he flies excellently,” his dad, Chuck Neely said.

Flying has always connected the two.

“I took him to an air show in Owensboro. He saw an F-22 Raptor fly, looked back at me and smiled. I knew he was sealed,” he said.

“I just remember, there’d be planes flying around the air and Dad would be like, wish that was you, and I was like, yeah,” Gaige remembered.

With his private pilot’s license, Neely said he flies his Grunman Traveler three to four hours each week.

“I have the freedom to pretty much go anywhere I want,” he said. “I don’t have to wait in traffic. I can just get on the plane, go and enjoy the view and just have fun.”

Neely still has plenty of runway with his future decisions, like where to go to school, and what career path to take.

“I’ll definitely go to further schooling for aviation,” he said. “I’m not sure where.”

With his senior year of high school in front of him, Neely did tell me his main objective for the near future.

“The goal is to fly to every airport in Kentucky before I turn 18,” shared Neely. “I’ve probably already got half of them down.”

Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.

Congressman Al Green and Alpha Phi Alpha Bring Slavery Remembrance to the U.S. Capitol

By CNN
Click here for updates on this story    August 12, 2026 (Houston Style Magazine) -- WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Saturday, August 15, 2026, the U.S. Capitol will become more than the nation’s legislative workplace. For a few consequential hours, it will also serve as a classroom of memory, accountability and democratic purpose as Congressman Al Green (TX-09)hosts Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. for a Slavery Remembrance Legislative Update and Assembly at the Capitol Visitor’s Center Auditorium.Beginning at 11:00 a.m. ET, the program will advance Green’s continuing effort to establish August 20 as a National Slavery Remembrance Day — ensuring that the brutality of slavery, the resistance of the enslaved and their foundational contributions to America are never pushed to the margins of public memory. This year’s theme, “Harder Yet May Be the Fight,” feels both historical and unmistakably contemporary. Democracy, after all, is strongest when a nation can examine its entire record — not simply the comfortable chapters.And this movement did not begin yesterday.In July 2022, the U.S. House approved Green’s H.Res. 517, the Original Slavery Remembrance Day Resolution, by a 218–207 vote. In the current 119th Congress, Green introduced H.J.Res. 67, supporting the designation of August as Slavery Remembrance Month and expanding the national conversation about slavery, its continuing effects and those who fought to end it.Saturday’s assembly will also spotlight another consequential proposal: Green’s push to secure a Congressional Gold Medal for enslaved Africans and their descendants.His H.R. 4885, introduced August 5, 2025, seeks to posthumously award a collective Congressional Gold Medal to Africans and their descendants enslaved in America through the abolition of slavery in 1865.The historical contrast is striking. In 1956, Congress awarded Congressional Gold Medals to the four known surviving Civil War veterans, with the authorization explicitly covering veterans who served in either the Union or Confederate forces. Green’s argument raises a powerful question: Should the millions whose uncompensated labor helped build American economic power receive comparable national recognition?Standing alongside Green will be Alpha Phi Alpha General President Brother Lucien J. Metellus, Jr. The partnership itself carries historic weight.photo General President Brother Lucien J. Metellus, Jr. met with Brother Congressman Al Green (D-TX) Founded at Cornell University in 1906, Alpha Phi Alpha became the first intercollegiate Greek-letter fraternity established for African American men. Its legacy of civil rights, civic participation and leadership includes Alpha men such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Thurgood Marshall and Adam Clayton Powell Jr.Metellus has warned against efforts to diminish the sacrifices and contributions of African Americans, saying Alpha Phi Alpha refuses to allow slavery’s evils to be forgotten or its ancestors left without proper honor. Green, himself an Alpha brother, puts the mission plainly: “Remembrance requires more than reflection; it requires us to confront our history.”That makes Saturday’s gathering bigger than a ceremony.It is an exercise in democratic citizenship.A mature democracy does not fear its history. It studies it. It names injustice without surrendering hope. Patriotism is not pretending America has always fulfilled its promises; it is demanding that America continually move closer to them.For Houston, the moment carries particular resonance. A Houston congressman is helping place a national spotlight on the enslaved people whose names too often disappeared while the wealth their labor generated remained.History may be written in books, but remembrance is written in public choices.On August 15, Congressman Al Green and Alpha Phi Alpha will make one choice unmistakably clear: America moves forward best when America remembers.EVENT DETAILS WHO: Congressman Al Green and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity and General President Brother Lucien J. Metellus, Jr.
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