07.11.07

Lady Bird Johnson, RIP

Posted in Around The Nation, Around The State at 11:09 pm by wcnews

I’m not a native Texan but my parents are. My first memory of Lady Bird Johnson is of my Father attempting to mimic her accent when she urged Americans to “to plant a tree, a shrub or a bush“, in her beautification campaign. My fraternal Grandmother had a reverence for the Johnson’s and what LBJ did for rural Texans/farmers. I remember how awed she was when we vistied LBJ’s Ranch and the Presidential Library.

What I know of Lady Bird Johnson is that she was a gracious women who married into a life of politics that, even though it wasn’t what she may have dreamed of, she made the best of it and made politics better for her having been involved in it.

I’ve always thought of her when driving the roads of Texas in the Spring with the wildflowers in bloom. Thank you Lady Bird Johnson for a life lived.

AAS has a special section remembering her life. BOR has more as well.

One thought I had is that three great Texas Democratic women have passed away in less than a year - Ann Richards, Molly Ivins and now Lady Bird Johnson. No more for a while please.

[UPDATE]: Rick Noriega has postponed his announcement out of respect for her passing via OffTheKuff.

[UPDATE]: More on Lady Bird from Rick Perlstein, Lady Bird is gone. Here’s the beginning:

I loved her. They’ll tell you about the wildflowers and the crusade against unsightly billboards. They won’t tell you about what a great liberal she was, what a brave warrior against racism she was - that she risked her life for these principles. After the jump, my tribute to her, from my book Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus. Read this astonishing story to honor a great American - and a great Southerner.

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