森。卡马拉·哈里斯对创造历史并不陌生。这位来自加州的年轻参议员是第二位黑人女性，也是第一位就职的南亚裔美国参议员。她也是第一位美国黑人，也是第一位担任加州司法部长的女性。
周二，民主党总统候选人乔·拜登选择哈里斯，他提名的前竞争对手，作为他11月的竞选伙伴选举s.如果哈里斯当选，她将不仅是第一位担任副总统的女性，也是历史上第一位第二号人物和最高当选的亚裔美国人。
这是她政治生涯中的一个里程碑式的时刻，可以追溯到1984年，当时她在霍华德大学。
当时，总统罗纳德·里根以压倒性的胜利赢得连任。史蒂夫·乔布斯推出了第一台麦金塔电脑。王子的“紫雨”专辑和电影发行了。和一个20岁的卡马拉·哈里斯是一个为自己成名的大学生。
她在霍华德大学的姐妹会成员吉尔·路易斯(Jill Louis)说:“她总是很平静，没有惊慌失措，也没有那种‘我不在乎’的专注。”
20世纪80年代初，当哈里斯和路易斯就读于历史上的黑人大学时，路易斯说他们正处于“成熟”时期，这个时期“可能性正在打开”，不仅仅是对女性，而是对所有有色人种。
“[我们这一代人]是在民权法案之后出生的。我们是在投票权法案之后提出来的。”“因此，我们认为，法律障碍现在已经消除，现在的问题是伸出援手，抓住机会。”
谢莉·扬-托姆普金斯(Shelley Young-Thompkins)博士说，在霍华德的校园里，她因“是一个有商业头脑的女人”而出名。她在学校的第一年就和哈里斯成为了朋友。
杨-汤普森说:“她和我…会被误认为是教授，因为我们会有公文包。”
在霍华德大学，学生们穿上盛装去上课是很常见的。路易斯说，他们这一代人“觉得如果我们现在不开始，对我们来说会有问题。”所以，我认为我们对待自己相当认真。”
利塔·罗萨里奥(Lita Rosario)招募哈里斯加入霍华德辩论队，她说，她仍然可以看到多年前在民主党辩论舞台上指导过的自信的大学生。
“很多时候，当雄性和雌性都在...罗萨里奥说:“无论是辩论还是激烈的谈话，男人们都会利用自己的身体来表达自己的观点。”“我看见那个卡玛拉了...他们那样做的时候，她没有退缩。她开始阐述自己的观点。这很有趣，因为当我今天在电视上看到她时，我仍然能看到她身上的那种性格。”
在全国广播公司新闻主持的第二次民主党总统辩论中，哈里斯有一个决定性的时刻，她向前副总统乔·拜登施压，要求他反对将联邦政府授权的商业作为整合美国公立学校的一种手段。
“加利福尼亚有一个小女孩，她是公立学校第二班的一员，每天都要坐公共汽车去上学。那个小女孩就是我。”
哈里斯说，如果不是因为学校整合给了她机会，她可能不会成为参议员。
卡罗尔·波特是哈里斯童年的一个朋友，她被公共汽车送到了加州伯克利的千橡树小学。
“能够坐公共汽车进入另一个环境。波特说:“它把你带进了另一个小世界。”“它只是扩展了你的思维。”
波特说她和哈里斯将在1971年至1973年间一起乘坐校车。公共汽车会把他们从伯克利公寓的工人阶级社区带到更富裕的伯克利山。她说她记得哈里斯是个快乐、健谈的孩子，也喜欢唱歌。
波特说，但哈里斯也非常专注。如果公共汽车司机不得不宣布，她会让车上的学生安静下来，这样每个人都能听到。哈里斯上课时也是这种态度。
“我记得她...”波特说。“她很注意;她没说话。你知道，有些孩子可能在后面说话……她在听故事。”
哈里斯是一位印度母亲和牙买加父亲的女儿，从小就了解种族和身份。她6岁时父母离异，母亲夏马拉·戈帕兰(Shyamala Gopalan)抚养哈里斯和妹妹玛雅·拉克什米·哈里斯(Maya Lakshmi Harris)，波特说:“做一个伟大的人，做你想做的人。”
“没有给她任何东西。我的意思是这很难。”"她是那种不让任何人告诉她自己是谁的人。"
波特说，戈帕兰是美国癌症研究的领军人物之一，她把两个女儿抚养成了“黑人女性”，因为“她们就是这样的人...卡玛拉对此感到非常自豪。”
斯泰西·约翰逊-巴蒂斯特从哈里斯四岁开始就认识他，她说，由单身母亲抚养长大给哈里斯灌输了“一定程度的勇气……以及内心的力量。”
当哈里斯加入拜登的阵营时，她的朋友们说他们为她感到骄傲。
Sen. Kamala Harris' friends on her upbringing: 'She was one to not let anyone tell her who she was'
Sen.Kamala Harrisis no stranger to making history. The junior senator from California is the second Black woman and first South Asian American senator to take office. She was also the first Black American and first woman to serve as California's attorney general.
On Tuesday, presumptive Democratic presidential nomineeJoe Bidenchose Harris, his former rival for the nomination, to be his running mate in the Novemberelections. If she's elected, Harris would not only be the first woman to serve as vice president but also be the first person of color to be second in command and the highest-elected Asian American in history.
It's a landmark moment in her political career that can be traced back to 1984, during her time at Howard University.
At the time, PresidentRonald Reaganwon re-election in a landslide victory.Steve Jobsintroduced the first Macintosh computer.Prince's "Purple Rain"album and movie were released. And a 20-year-oldKamala Harriswas an undergrad making a name for herself.
"She was always the one who was very even keeled, not fazed, and not in that 'I don't care way' -- in a focused way," said Jill Louis, one of her sorority sisters at Howard.
When Harris and Louis attended the historically Black university in the early 1980s, Louis said they were "coming of age" during a time when the "possibilities were opening up" not just for women but for all people of color.
"[Our generation] came up after the Civil Rights Act. We came up after the Voting Rights Act," Louis said. "So we believed that the legal barriers were now gone, and now it was about reaching out and grabbing opportunity."
She was known around Howard's campus for "being a woman [who meant] business," according to Dr. Shelley Young-Thompkins, who befriended Harris in her freshman year at the school.
"She and I…would be mistaken for professors because we would have briefcases," Young-Thompkins said.
It was common for students to dress up to go to class at Howard. Rather than wearing jeans or sweatpants, Louis said their generation "felt like if we didn't start right now, that would be problematic for us. So, I think we took ourselves fairly seriously."
Harris was recruited for the Howard debate team by Lita Rosario, who said she can still see the confident undergrad she mentored all those years ago on the Democratic debate stage today.
"A lot of times, when males and females are in...debates or spirited conversations, the men kind of use their physicalness to kind of make their point," Rosario said. "I saw that Kamala...she didn't back down when they did that. She proceeded to make her point. And it's funny because when I look at her on television today, I still see that character in her."
In the second Democratic presidential debates hosted by NBC News, Harris had a defining moment when she pressed former Vice President Joe Biden on his opposition of federally mandated busing as a means of integrating American public schools.
"There was a little girl in California who was part of the second class to integrate her public schools and she was bused to school every day. That little girl was me," Harris said during the July debate.
Harris has said that she might not have become a senator if it wasn't for the opportunities afforded to her through school integration.
Carole Porter, one of Harris' childhood friends, was bussed with her to Thousand Oaks Elementary School in Berkeley, California.
"To be able to be bussed and go into this other environment. It transports you into a whole other little universe," Porter said. "It just expands your mind."
Porter said that she and Harris would take the school bus together between 1971 and 1973. The bus would take them from their working class neighborhood in the Berkeley flats into the more affluent Berkeley Hills. She said she remembers Harris being a happy, talkative kid who also liked to sing.
But Harris was also keenly attentive, Porter said. If the bus driver had to make an announcement, she would calm the students on the bus so that everyone could listen. The same attitude applied when Harris would be in class.
"I remember her...sitting in the front of the circle," Porter said. "She was paying attention; she wasn't talking. You know, some of the kids might be in the back talking… She was listening to the story."
Harris, the daughter of an Indian mother and Jamaican father, learned about race and identity from an early age. Her parents separated when she was 6 years old, and her mother, Shyamala Gopalan, raised Harris and her sister, Maya Lakshmi Harris, "to be great and be who you want to be," said Porter.
"There was nothing given to her. I mean it was hard," Porter said. "She was one to not let anyone tell her who she was."
Gopalan, one of the leading cancer researchers in the country, raised her two daughters "as Black women," Porter said, because "that's what they were...and Kamala really was proud of it."
Being raised by a single mother instilled a "certain amount of grit…and just inner strength" in Harris, said Stacey Johnson-Batiste, who has known Harris since they were about 4 years old.
As Harris joins Biden's ticket, her friends spoke about how proud they are of her.
