Barbara Mikulski biography

Synopsis

Early Life

For more than 30 years, Barbara Mikulski has served in the U.S. Congress, first as a representative and now as a senator. She broke the record for the longest-serving female senator in 2012, but she did not originally set out to become a politician. Growing up in East Baltimore, Mikulski first aspired to be a scientist after seeing a movie about French chemist and physicist Marie Curie.

Mikulski comes from a Polish, working-class neighborhood and inherited her can-do spirit and determination from her family. Both her grandfather and father were local shopkeepers. Her grandfather ran a bakery, and her father had a grocery store. Mikulski helped out with her father's store in addition to studying hard in school. She went an all-girls Catholic high school and then studied sociology at Mount St. Agnes College.

After completing her bachelor's degree in 1958, Mikulski then earned a master's degree in social work from the University of Maryland. She put her education work for the people of Baltimore, beginning in 1965. Toward the end of the decade, Mikulski became a community organizer, waging war against a 16-lane highway to run through East Baltimore. She brought different segments of the racially and ethnically diverse neighborhood together to stop the highway project. Her coalition, known as Southeast Council Against the Road, or SCAR, won their battle with city hall.

Political Career

Mikulski started out in local politics, winning a seat on the Baltimore City Council in 1971. During her five years with the council, she made her first attempt at national office. Mikulski failed in her 1974 bid for the U.S. Senate, but she won a place in the U.S. House of Representatives two years later. Mikulski's dedication and strong work ethic helped her achieve this goal. She once said that it took "knocking on 15,000 doors, wearing out four pairs, and getting mugged by 47 chihuahuas" to win the election. While in House, she served on the Merchant Marine & Fisheries Committee and Energy & Commerce Committee. Mikulski also advocated for legislation to protect children and supported the Equal Rights Amendment.

In the mid-1980s, Mikulski made great strides again for women in politics. She ran for the Senate again in 1986, becoming the first female Democrat to do so in her right. Women had served in the Senate before her, but they were completing the terms won by others. Mikulski had support from such celebrities as singer Carly Simon and renown feminist Gloria Steinem as she raised the necessary funds for her successful campaign.

Mikulski told Time magazine that "In the Senate, I plan to use the good mind, the good mouth, the good heart that God gave me." The prominently male Senate may not have known what to do with the feisty legislator from Maryland at first.