LBJ

Lady Bird Johnson died today at the age of 94 in Austin, Tx. My reaction, "She was still alive?"

I really don't know anything about her other than she had the same initials as her husband, the 36th president of the United States, Lyndon Baines Johnson. Which leaves us with Wiki. I guess I didn't even know for sure that "Lady Bird" was a nickname. It makes sense but I don't ever recall having heard her real name, Claudia, ever mentioned.

She gets mentioned here because it dawned on me when I heard the news that her husband's first run for the presidency, 1964, was the first election my parents would have been old enough to vote in. In my mother's case by just two days. I don't know if they voted. I feel confident in saying if my father had voted that year his vote would have been cast for Johnson. I suspect my mother's as well. Both grew up in strongly Democratic households.