Donald was born in Silver City, New Mexico on November 11, 1919. His father was Valdimir LeRoy Harris. Valdimir was born and raised in Kansas. He served in the U. S. Army Medical Corp during WWI and was stationed at Fort Bayard, New Mexico, just 10 miles from Silver City. It was here that he met and married Lillian Leota Brumback Harris. While Donald was still an infant the family moved to an army base in Texas where they remained until he was discharged. At that time Valdimir returned to his home in Kansas and Lillian and Donald returned to Silver City. They never again lived together as a family.
Donald's mother was born in Silver City on October 22, 1899 and died in Deming, New Mexico in August, 1982. She is burried in the family plot in Evergreen Cemetary, New Port, Kentucky.
In 1922 Ernest Brumback purchased the Deming Graphic, a weekly newspaper, and the family, including Lillian and Donald, moved to Deming. They lived in a rented house at 804 West Pine Street, where they lived until Donald enter Deming High School. At that time they (Minnie, Lillian and Donald) moved to a house across the street form the High School at 523 West Ash Street.
Donald was a excellent student and athlete. He quarterbacked the undefeated football team in 1937. After his graduation from High School in 1938 he attended the New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell, New Mexico. After two years he returned to Deming to take over the Deming Graphic when his grandmother, Minnie, was needed to take care of her ailing mother, Mary Louise Fox Mussman at her home in Hyde Park, Cincinnati, Ohio.
After her mother passed on she returned to Deming and Donald then Enlisted in the US Army. He became a Navagator, was commissioned second Lieutenant, and was in the last week of training before his B-24 Liberator Bomber crew was slated for shipping to the European Theater during WWII when the plane crashed into Mount Franklin, El Paso, Texas, in February of 1944>