EARLY TOP GUNS: Ex-test pilot Tony LeVier...

EARLY TOP GUNS: Ex-test pilot Tony LeVier vividly recalls the time that he flew a new jet fighter, the XP-80A, on March 20, 1945. As well he should. The plane disintegrated underneath him at 11,000 feet. . . . LeVier, now 80, was one of many former Lockheed Corp. employees who marked the 50th anniversary of the “Skunk Works,” the celebrated top-secret unit that has produced some landmark airplanes in Burbank and Palmdale. See Valley Briefing, B5.

HIGH MARKS: Jeff Nadeau of Monroe High in North Hills got the jump on his competition at the state track and field finals. . . . Nadeau cleared 7 feet, 2 inches, to win the high jump title, one inch better than Jeremy Fischer of Camarillo. . . . Also posting victories were Reseda’s Drue Powell in the 110-meter high hurdles and Quartz Hill’s Cheaza Figueroa in the girls’ triple jump. (C1)

CELEBRATING FREEDOM: Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863. But many slaves did not learn of the proclamation ending slavery in Confederate-controlled territory until June 19. For generations, African-Americans have marked the day as Juneteenth. About 400 African-Americans gathered at Lancaster City Park on Saturday to celebrate Juneteenth with a picnic, speeches, music and dance.

UNITY MARCH: A multiethnic crowd of more than 400 marchers gathered in blistering heat for a somber one-mile procession through Palmdale billed as a March for Racial Harmony (B18). . . . The march was in response to a five-stanza poem about an illegal Mexican immigrant distributed by Assemblyman William J. (Pete) Knight to his colleagues. Knight later apologized for the poem many people branded as racist.