SPEAKIN’ OUT NEWS
HUNTSVILLE — Drake State Community and Technical College made history Monday when it commemorated a transformational $5 million gift from the E. Hart Fund during a special campus ceremony at the Leidos Advanced Training Complex — and the story behind the gift is as powerful as the gift itself.
The donation, made through the advisors of the E. Hart Fund, is the largest gift by an individual donor ever recorded in the history of the Alabama Community College System and the largest in Drake State’s 65-year history. The investment will be used to remodel Drake State’s automotive building and classrooms, expanding the training facilities where future students will learn the hands-on technical skills needed to enter today’s workforce. Architectural drawings and renderings of the new building were shared with attendees at Monday’s commemoration event, held Monday, April 27, 2026 at 9:00 a.m. at the Leidos Advanced Training Center, 3421 Meridian Street North, Huntsville, AL 35811. Drake State President Dr. Patricia G. Sims, advisors of the E. Hart Fund, community and business leaders, and friends and loved ones of Ms. Fairhurst were all present.
The E. Hart Fund honors the legacy of Ellenae Hart Henry-Fairhurst, who passed away on April 4, 2024 at the age of 81. Born in Dayton, Ohio in 1943, she was the daughter of Jack J. Hart Sr. — a Dunbar High School football coach and mentor to hundreds of young men for 36 years — and Ellen Nora Hart, a schoolteacher for 32 years. Those roots shaped everything. She earned her B.S. from Miami University and an M.A. in consumer psychology from the University of Detroit, then worked at Motown Records before joining Ford Motor Company in 1968. Seventeen years later, when Ford’s Minority Dealer Operations told her she lacked retail experience and questioned why she would risk a stable career, she was undeterred. “I was convinced I could be a successful dealer and their answer was unsatisfactory,” she said. She went to Chrysler instead, completed their dealer training program in 1988, and never looked back. In 1992 she purchased a Dodge dealership in Huntsville. In 1999 she became the first African American female in North America to own an Infiniti dealership — and then a Lexus dealership. By 2002 her autoplex was generating $56 million in annual sales. Her memorial service was held at First Baptist Missionary Baptist Church in Huntsville. She was recognized by Ebony Magazine’s Power 100 in 2016 and interviewed by The HistoryMakers in 2017. She avoided the spotlight, letting her work speak for itself.
The connection between Ellenae Hart Henry-Fairhurst’s life and Drake State’s Automotive Technology program is not incidental. It is the story of a pioneering Black woman in the auto industry — one who worked her way from secretary to multimillion-dollar dealership owner — investing directly in the next generation of Black automotive professionals at a historically Black institution founded on 32 acres deeded by Alabama A&M University in 1961. As the official press release stated, this transformative gift “puts her legacy into action and advances the vision she had of educational equity and workforce readiness for all students.” Drake State’s Automotive program has been ASE Master Certified by the National Institute of Automotive Service Excellence, and it is among the college’s oldest and most storied programs, dating back to the school’s very first year of classes.
The ceremony took place at the Leidos Advanced Training Complex — itself a symbol of the partnerships transforming Drake State. Leidos, a Fortune 500 defense and technology company, announced a $1.75 million gift to Drake State in 2024 and made the college a NASA subcontractor under its AEGIS contract. The complex bearing the company’s name now hosted the celebration of the largest individual gift in Alabama community college history.
Monday’s announcement arrives at a moment of extraordinary momentum for Drake State. On April 27 — the same day as the E. Hart Fund ceremony — Sen. Katie Britt announced she secured $700,000 in federal funding for Drake State as part of the FY2026 appropriations process, part of more than $5.74 million she said she helped secure for the Alabama Community College System.
Drake State President Dr. Patricia Sims has led the college through a period of unprecedented growth in partnerships, grants, and national recognition. Under her leadership, Drake State became the first Alabama college to receive a $1.5 million Strengthening Community Colleges Training Grant from the U.S. Department of Labor, secured a $1.3 million NASA grant for STEM minority pipeline development, and launched a university transfer partnership with Western Governors University.
The $5 million gift from the E. Hart Fund is the capstone of that momentum — and a testament to what Ellenae Hart Henry-Fairhurst believed: that Black students, given the right tools and the right facility, can go anywhere.