Patsy Mink Life, Family, Goal, Career & Death

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Patsy Mink Life, Family, Goal, Career Death
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How Did Patsy Mink Live?

• Patsy Mink grew up in Hawaii, where she was
  treated badly because of her race and her
  gender. In 1964, she was nominated to the U.S.
  House of Representatives. During her time in
  office, she worked to pass laws that would make
  things easier for the generations that came after
  her. Mink died in September 2002. Her name was
  already on the ballot for the upcoming
  congressional election, and it was too late to
  take it off. After she died, she won a resounding
  victory in November.

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Early Life

• Patsy Matsu Takemoto, who became Mink, was born
  on December 6, 1927, in Paia, Maui, Hawaii
  Territory, to Suematsu Takemoto and Mitama
  Tateyama Takemoto. Mink is a third-generation
  Japanese American. Both sets of her grandparents
  left Japan to work on sugar plantations in
  Hawaii.
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Family

• Mink raise up on the island of Maui, where
  Japanese American and native Hawaiian workers
  were treated differently by white plantation
  bosses. Eugene Takemoto was the name of her
  brother. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor in
  December 1941, many Japanese Americans living in
  Hawaii were taken into custody. Minks dad was
  addressed by the police however at that point let
  go.

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School

• Mink got his diploma from Maui High School in
  1944. She was both the leader of her class and
  the top student. She went to Wilson College, the
  University of Nebraska, where she protested
  racial discrimination in student housing, and the
  University of Hawaii, where she got a bachelors
  degree in zoology and chemistry in 1948.

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Goal

• Minks first goal for his career was to become a
  doctor. She tried to get into several medical
  schools, but none of them would let her in. After
  being hurt by that, she decided to become a
  lawyer instead. She went to law school at the
  University of Chicago, where she was one of only
  two women in her class. She may have been
  accepted because the school thought she was an
  international student by mistake. Mink received
  her degree in 1951.

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Start Of A Job

• Mink couldnt find a law firm in Chicago that
  would hire her, so she and her family moved to
  Hawaii. In 1953, she was the first Japanese
  American to be admitted to the Hawaii bar. Mink
  was the first woman to be licensed as an attorney
  in Hawaii. Even though she was a woman, a mother,
  and married to a man of a different race, she
  still ran into problems when she tried to get a
  job (her husband was white). Mink ended up
  starting her own business instead.

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Democratic Party

• Mink also spent more time working for the
  Democratic Party because he couldnt find a job.
  At the time, the party was growing in Hawaii,
  where Republicans ran the government before it
  became a state.

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Career In Politics

• Mink was elected to the Hawaii House of
  Representatives in 1956. After two year, she was
  selected to be a senator for the territory. After
  Hawaii turned into a state in 1959, Mink ran for
  Congress yet didnt win. Then, in 1962, she was
  chosen for the Hawaii state senate.

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Serve In The U.S. House Of Representatives

• Mink was chosen to serve in the U.S. House of
  Representatives in 1964. She did this even though
  no local party supported her, which has been a
  problem for her throughout her career. She was
  the first Asian American woman, the first woman
  of colour, and the second woman from Hawaii to
  serve in Congress when she took her oath of
  office.

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Civil Rights

• Minks top priorities in the legislature were
  civil rights, the rights of women, and helping
  with child care and education. Title IX was one
  of her most important works. She helped write
  this law, which says that public schools,
  colleges, and universities must treat men and
  women equally in education and other areas where
  the federal government gives money, like sports.
  Mink also worked for the Womens Education Equity
  Act to be passed in 1974.

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Assistant Secretary Of State

• Mink ran for the Senate in 1976 but lost. He
  stayed in Congress until 1977. She was chosen to
  be the assistant secretary of state for oceans
  and international, environmental, and scientific
  affairs under President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to
  1978. From 1983 to 1987, Mink was a member of the
  Honolulu City Council. Before she was selected to
  the U.S. House again in 1990, she ran for
  governor of Hawaii and mayor of Honolulu and lost
  both times.

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Start The Congressional Asian Pacific American
Caucus

• During Minks second year in Congress, she worked
  to make sure that laws like Title IX stayed in
  place. Mank also helped start the Congressional
  Asian Pacific American Caucus in 1994. After
  Anita Hill said that Clarence Thomas had sexually
  harassed her, she protested against his
  appointment to the Supreme Court. Mink stayed in
  Congress until September 2002, when she died. She
  was re-elected to Congress after her death, in
  2002.

14
Personal Life

• Mink met John Francis Mink, who was a graduate
  student at the University of Chicago, while he
  was there. They got married in 1951, and in 1952,
  their daughter Gwendolyn was born.
• Mink didnt know she was taking part in a study
  of diethylstilbestrol while she was pregnant with
  her daughter. This was found out more than 20
  years after her daughter was born. The goal of
  DES, a synthetic estrogen, was to stop
  miscarriages, but people who were exposed to it
  had a number of health risks, including cancer.
  Mink filed a lawsuit, and the case was later
  settled.

15
Award

• Title IX was changed to the Patsy T. Mink Equal
  Opportunity in Education Act after Mink died. In
  2014, Barack Obama gave Mink the Presidential
  Medal of Freedom after he had died. Patsy Mink
  Ahead of the Majority was a documentary about her
  life and what she did. The Patsy Takemoto Mink
  Foundation wants to carry on the work that she
  did all her life.

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Death

• Mink died on September 28, 2002, in Honolulu,
  Hawaii. He was 74 years old. Her death was caused
  by complications from chicken pox that led to
  pneumonia.