Geraldine Ferraro – August 26, 1935

 “Why bother? She’s pretty. She’s a girl. She’ll get married.” – Geraldine Ferraro’s uncle concerning her education.

Geraldine Anne Ferraro was born on August 26, 1935, in Newburgh, NY, to Antonetta (Corrieri), and Dominick Ferraro. Antonetta was a first-generation Italian-Ameircan and Dominic was an immigrant from Italy.

The 1940 census finds her living with her parents and older brother at 54 Mill Street in Newburgh. She had two other older brothers, but one died in infancy, and one at age 3. Her father is listed as the proprietor of a bar and grill. He owned two restaurants. Her mother is listed as the proprietor of a department store, but she was actually a seamstress and maybe worked at the department store.

The neighborhood was blue-collar with painters, textile mill workers, and mechanics living there. Three other families were immigrants from Italy and one was from England.

Later life

In 1944, Dominic died from a heart attack. Antonetta invested and lost the family’s money, forcing them to move from Newburgh to the South Bronx. It appears that Geraldine didn’t live there much as she first stayed on as a boarder at her parochial school in Newburg and then briefly attended a school in the Bronx before attending and living at Marymount Academy in Tarrytown, NY. She graduated from Marymount Manhattan College in 1956.

She became an elementary school teacher in Queens, “because that’s what women were supposed to do,” but then decided to attend law school where an admissions officer said “I hope you’re serious, Gerry. You’re taking a man’s place, you know.” She earned her Juris Doctor degree from Fordham University Law School in 1960, having attended in the evenings while still teaching 2nd grade.

She married John Zaccaro, a real estate developer, whose finances and taxes were often major issues in her political campaigns. She was a lawyer, assistant district attorney, and eventually member of the U.S. House of Representatives where she quickly rose in the ranks of the Democratic party. As a member of the House, she represented the New York 9th Congressional District in Queens, a district known for its conservative views and home of the fictional Bunker family from the TV series All in the Family. Ferraro ran on a law and order platform and called herself a small “c” conservative. Her campaign slogan was “Finally, a Tough Democrat.” This strategy may actually have won over Archie Bunker while losing the solid Democrat vote of Michael (Meathead) Stivic.

In 1984, Walter Mondale, the Democratic Presidential nominee, tapped her to be his Vice-Presidential running mate. She was the first woman to be on the Presidential ticket of a major party. The Mondale/Ferraro ticket was crushed by the reelection campaign of Ronald Reagan/George Bush, winning only Minnesota and the District of Columbia.

Geraldine Ferraro was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 1998 and died of pneumonia related to multiple myeloma in 2011.

For the full story of Geraldine Ferraro, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geraldine_Ferraro

Other happenings on August 26, 1935:

Luxembourg and the Soviet Union established diplomatic relations with each other

Tomorrow – The real Norman Bates

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Sources

• Wikipedia.org
• Ancestry.com
• Onthisday.com
• Picryl.com
• Youtube.com