For over 30 years, Reggie Selma was one of CNN’s most dedicated and knowledgeable photojournalists based in their Washington, D. C. bureau. For more than 30 years, Reggie was one of CNN’s most dedicated and knowledgeable photojournalists. He has traveled extensively across the globe, filming every U.S. president from Reagan to Obama, as well as covering numerous proceedings in Congress. In 1982, Reggie became CNN’s Washington, D.C. Bureau’s First African-American cameraman assigned to the White House.

One of my most inspirational moments took place when I was just four years old. It was a football game between Alabama a&m, and their archrival, Alabama State. And my parents took me and my brother Jeffrey, to see the game, but also to see our older brother Joe play in the marching band. So while my family is watching the game, I snuck away to go find my big brother Joe. Now this is a stadium that holds around 50,000 people. 

 

I find him and he turns around, he says, “What are you doing here? Where’s my daddy?” All I could do was point to the stuck top of the stadium. And he says, “You’re going to get me in trouble.” So he takes me by my hand. He leaves the band. He’s got his saxophone around his neck and we walk all the way up to the top of the stadium. I knew I had done something wrong, but he wasn’t yelling at me. He was just saying just be quiet and maybe Daddy won’t notice that you’re gone. He’s holding my hand. We walk all the way up. He said, “I’ll take care of you.” When we get to where my family is, he just pushed me into the into the aisle and I don’t think my parents knew I was missing.

He could have yelled at me and maybe gotten the Usher to take me back. But he didn’t care that the bandleader saw him doing this, he was going to take care of his baby brother. And that was just so inspiring to me. That was one of the moments I’ll always remember.