Condoleezza Rice, to date, is one of the most powerful and unique women in the history of United States politics. However, her many victories didn’t come without hard work and dedication. Rice came from extremely humble beginnings and rose through the ranks in the nation’s Capitol to become the first Black woman to serve as U.S. Secretary of State (she was the country’s 66th).
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Rice grew up in Birmingham, Alabama in the 50s and 60s—not too far from the jailhouse where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was once a prisoner. Despite being surrounded by racism in the segregated south and a divided nation, Rice’s parents, both teachers, instilled in her that she could be anything she wanted. This advice was taken to heart.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of Denver in 1974, obtained her master’s from the University of Notre Dame in 1975 and earned her Ph.D. from the University of Denver’s Graduate School of International Studies in 1981. That same year, she began teaching at Stanford University as a political science professor—a position that she has held for more than 30 years.
She found her way to Washington D.C. by the mid 80s and worked as an international affairs fellow. In 1989, she became director of Soviet and East European affairs with the National Security Council, and special assistant to President George H.W. Bush during the dissolution of the Soviet Union and German reunification. In 1997, she was on the Federal Advisory Committee on Gender-Integrated Training in the Military.
President George W. Bush appointed Rice as national security adviser by in 2001, becoming the first Black woman (and second woman) to hold the position. This was right before again made history as the first Black female U.S. Secretary of State, a post she held from 2005 to 2009.
Highlights from Rice’s tenure as Secretary of State include negotiating the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, fighting against various kinds of slavery and helping to negotiate a U.S./India agreement on peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
Rice returned to her teaching post at Stanford in 2009, has written four books and in August 2012, became one of the first two admitted into previously all-male August National Golf Club. In other words, she got game—literally and figuratively.
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