Eleanor Ramsey

[Ramsey]

Character Type: Secondary

Name: Eleanor Joliet Ramsey

Age: 37

Born: 2358.11.15

Birthplace: Tycho City, Moon

Race: Human

Appearance: Eleanor is of African American descent.  She has black hair and dark brown eyes with light brown skin tones.  She has a broad smile and is very pretty.  Her hair is typically up in a braid, but when it is down, it only reaches her shoulders.  She has a slight frame and at 5 feet 5 inches tall and 115 pounds, she is considered pettite.

Her hands have callouses and cut on them from her years of working in Engineering.

When off duty, she prefers comfortable clothing, but isn't one for dresses.

Rank: Captain

Position: CO of the USS Redemption

Personality: Having fought bias / prejudice/ and discrimination all her life, due to her being small and a woman, Eleanor is a woman how is full of grit and steel.  She doesn't back down from bullies and is quick to voice her thoughts on any matter.  That doesn't mean that she isn't compassionate, because she is... sometimes too much.  She shows care and loyalty to her crew and will back them to the gates of Unimatrix 1, but she is not forgiving of betrayal. Despite a hard exterior, she is loving and kind with people that she trusts and respects.  

Coming from Engineering, she is highly talented with all Starfleet technology and knows her station inside in out.  She is not above getting her hands dirty and helping out when needed and goes absolutely crazy over any new alien technology  that she can find.  Her quarters and office are littered with devices and technology that was gifted to her or that she is working on.  She can be a bit of a clutter bug at times.

She exhibits strengths in energy and weapon systems and that helps her in her dealing with the Deuterium Trade that goes on at the station.  She is not above asking for help and cares for her crew.  For an Engineer, she is good with tactics.

She also has opportunities in several areas...  for as much tactical information she has, she is sorely lacking in the tact department.  She says what she thinks and that has alienated her from several of her superiors.  Her office is cluttered and can leave the impression that she is scatterbrained, but that would be a wrong assumption.  Due to fighting against discrimination, she is quick to take offense to several things.

Bio: Eleanor was born in Tycho City on the moon in 2351.  Her parents, Robert and Lorraine Ramsey, both worked for Starfleet Engineering... her mother was a substation shift officer and her father worked at the nearby Planetia Utopia Shipyards on warp cores.  With this much technical and tinkering ability in her life it was no wonder that Eleanor turned out the way she is.

Eleanor had an older brother, Samuel and a younger brother, Richard.  They both grew up to join Starfleet on board the USS Warspite and the USS Delphi respectively.

Growing up, Eleanor's childhood was pretty standard, no real tragedy in her life.  The only really unique aspect to her early childhood was that her parents would bring home little projects for them to work on.  They would create bits and pieces of technology, or repair obsolete components.  It became a great competition with her brothers to see who could do the best.  So while most of her friends were playing with dolls and such, she was rebuilding components and fixing old tricorders.

As she grew older her love of machines grew as well and by the time she was 15, she had created her own speeder bike that ran on thrusters with her brothers.  She volunteered to test it out and after about 100 feet, she was thrown from the machine when it plowed nose first into a ditch.  She was rushed to the hospital with several broken ribs and a broken wrist.  While horrified by the injuries, her parents were also very impressed with what they had been able to design.

In the fall of 2368, Eleanor left Tycho City and her parents to attend Starfleet Academy.  Samuel had already gone there 2 years previously and Richard was just starting the process and would join her next year.

Arriving, she met several people who were unsure of where they wanted their career to go.  When meeting with the counselor, Eleanor was adamant… Engineering.

Her time at the Academy flew by fast and Eleanor loved every minute of it.  Though she spent much of her time in the Engineering Lab, she found time to have fun and cut loose.  She made friends and really experienced life.  She even broke a few rules… most going unnoticed, but she was caught a time or two (see SFA Record #129-A7Delta – Rocket Bike Races, and SFA Record #129-Beta 12Zeta – Gravity Manipulations).  

Through it all, there was only really one nagging negative experience.  Eleanor frequently faced discrimination.  It wasn’t based on her race or that she was human… it was because she was a female, and a pretty one at that.  Many of the other Engineering students were male and several could not deal with females.  She found herself to be left out of many group outings.  This made her be more forceful to be included and to have her say.  By the end of her time at Starfleet Academy in 2372, Eleanor was mostly accepted by all but a few individuals, but those early times of being alienated formed a good portion of her personality.

In the Spring of 2372, Eleanor graduated from Starfleet Academy with the Officer’s Rank of Ensign.  She was assigned to the USS Hathaway, a Nebula Class Starship that worked in the Beta Quadrant in the Raeyan Sector.  Her two main responsibilities were as the Warp Systems Specialist.  Basically, she oversaw a team of Crewmen who maintained the warp core and performed repairs and upgrades on it.  The puzzles and games that she had played as a child were now very useful to her as she worked to maintain the heart and soul of the ship, as she came to see it.

Still, even here out in the field, she had to work to be taken seriously.  Either through cultural differences, alien bias towards humans, or just plain bigotry, Eleanor found that several officers discounted her ideas until being presented by another person.  This brought out the “steel in her” as some of her teammates called it.  Still, she was professional, but when she asked to speak freely, that officer really had to determine if he wanted that much honesty.

Luckily, her efforts were being noticed by the right people and in 2376, she was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant (JG).  She was placed in charge of all Warp Core operations and was tasked with leading up the Matter/Energy Systems team as well.  She answered directly to the Assistant Chief of Engineering, Lt. Carter.

In 2378, the USS Hathaway put in for a long refit and upgrade at the Avalon Fleet Yards.  Knowing that it would be a year before the ship left dock, Eleanor looked for another posting.  She found two to her liking.  One was on the USS Ark Royal, an Ambassador Class Starship working out of the Alpha Quadrant.  That was would be more familiar to her.  The other one, which was more intriguing and more of a challenge, was in the Engineering Department aboard Starbase 349 at Raeya III.  

Choosing to push herself, she applied for the position at SB 349 and was accepted.  A short shuttle ride later, she was entering the Starbase, awed by the size of it.  Working under Commander Monday, she was put in charge of the Warp Core due to her expertise and experience.  

Starbase 349 was a planet unto itself and Eleanor is always amazed at the feat of Engineering that went into creating such a large station.  With her rank, she was assigned as the lead officer of Third Shift, which operated the overnight hours.  She formed good friendships with her teams and really worked on developing their skills and pushing them to work as a team.  It is also the time that started dating Aiden Wilkins, one of the Lieutenants in Flight Control.  They dated for a few years and though they never married, at the beginning of 2381, they welcomed a son, Quinn, into their lives.

Tragedy struck early, though, and for the first time, Eleanor was dealt a blow that she didn’t think she could recover from.  Aiden was ferrying a group of officers from SB 349 to Avalon Fleet Yards when they ran into some trouble.  On approach, the navigation controls on the shuttle “Harken” froze up and the shuttle entered the asteroid field surrounded AFY.  While rescue teams were quick to respond, they were too late.  By the time they found the shuttle, it was nearly destroyed by the asteroids.  One whole side was penetrated and the entire crew suffered rapid decompression and died.

So Eleanor was left alone with a newborn baby, a career and her love was lost.  Here she would have floundered except that her drive to win was too great.  When she felt like quitting, she would just look down at her baby’s face and find the will to live another day.  Towards the end of 2381, she got some good news from home.  Her parents had asked for an assignment on SB 349 and it had been granted.  So now, her mother retired to help raise Quinn and her father worked on projects out of AFY.

Eleanor’s hard work began to really pay off as she was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant in 2384.  By now, she held the position of Assistant Chief of Engineering with most people calling her ACE.  She developed a close friendship with Commander Monday and though they became the best of friends, neither of them chose to pursue a romantic relationship.  

As she took on more responsibility, her leadership skills began to emerge and they were being recognized.  Engineering teams were running more efficiently and performance evaluations for her crews were steadily improving.  Eleanor expressed her interest in Command to Monday who, in turn, enrolled her in Starfleet Command courses.  During this time, Eleanor found the perfect test subject for her to practice one… little 3 year old Quinn.  If she could convince her son to do his chores and mind her, then she could convince anyone to do their job.  It was a hard fought time with this as Quinn was as stubborn as she was, but it really helped her see how she dealt with adversity and apathy.

In 2386, Commander Monday took on another assignment and Eleanor, being the most logical choice, stepped into the role of Chief of Engineering, though most people still called her ACE.  As the next few years progressed, Eleanor became more and more interested in Command.  After talking to her friends and family, she decided to submit her application to the Command Department.  The interview process was rigorous and extensive, almost to the point of exhaustion, but Eleanor found the silence in between the interviews to be more agitating.  

Finally, the word arrived.  Her application was accepted and she was immediately offered several positions to choose from.  The one that caught her interest wouldn’t be available until 2388.  So even though it would delay her career, Eleanor accepted the Commanding Officer Position of USS Orion that was assigned to Citadel Station.

So for the next year, she worked on bring up her Assistant Chief of Engineering to take over.  In 2388, Eleanor started the year feeling very out of place.  Though the uniform fit the same and was made out of the same material, the yellow she had been wearing her entire career was now replaced with the Red of Command.  As she took the station, she was also promoted to the rank of Lt. Commander.  Taking Quinn, now 7 with her, she made her trip to Citadel Station to continue her career under Admiral Shala Itris.