We The People: This Day in History, December 3
Eddie Bernice Johnson nurse turned trailblazing Texas legislator
WACO, Texas (KWTX) - On December 3, 1935, former United States Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson was born in Waco, Texas.
Graduating from AJ Moore High School, the only school in Waco for African Americans at the time, she then got her nursing degree from Saint Mary’s College at Notre Dame, and went to work at the VA hospital in Dallas.
Throughout her life, Johnson saw and experienced discrimination, which encouraged her to run for office.
In 1972, Johnson was elected to the Texas House of Representatives in a landslide, becoming the first black woman to win an electoral office from Dallas.
She went on to serve three terms in the Texas Senate before being elected to the U.S. House in 1992, representing Texas’s 30th congressional district until January 2023.
Less than a year later, on December 31, Johnson passed away at the age of 89.
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