"I think you just have to do what you want to do, be sensitive to
the opinions of others, but be part of our melting pot of race and gender. I
find that today's young people have three wonderful assets - they don't discriminate
because of race, they don't discriminate because of gender, and they also want
to do something meaningful. I applaud all of that."
Liz Carpenter
Poilitcal Journalist and former Lady Bird Johnson Press Secretary
Executive Summary:
Liz Carpenter joined Cyberways and Waterways to share her career experience serving
as Lady Bird Johnson's press secretary, founding the National Women's Political Caucus, chairing an organization
that fought for the Equal Rights Amendment, and serving as assistant secretary in the Department of
Education.
Political Career
- It was very easy to be interested in politics.
I grew up in the Depression, when the men were standing in bread lines, waiting to get a job. You couldn't help but be interested in politics because those
were the people you had to depend on to lift the country out of its unemployment, and I've made a
lifetime out of it.
- Mrs. Johnson is the only First Lady who ever got a journalism degree (from the University of Texas)
and the only one who knew what the five W's and H mean (why, where, what, when, who, and how).
- But I loved all the things I learned from that job - you were learning all the time and it was an
exciting place to be. I never stopped getting a thrill out of walking up
to the White House under the giant spreading trees. If you don't get a thrill from it, then you don't
belong there.
On Writing
- I'm 81 years old. I'm going to try to keep on living and keep on writing. I am working on another
book about letters because with email we don't have the same respect for letter writing we once did.
I have fifty years' worth of letters that are funny, letters that are beautifully written,
letters that tell about events that I was witnessing, and I think it would be a book worth reading.
- It [humor] has taught me a lot about making speeches, too, and
my formula when making speeches is to start with a laugh, put the meat in the
middle, and wave the flag at the end. That's a basic formula, but it helps the
listeners to have laughter relief.
- I really think if you are a reporter or a writer, you've got a lifetime job. Age doesn't count against you. As long as you
can write something interesting and sell it, you can earn your living. And I'm still earning my living at age 81.
Women's Equal Rights Amendment
- The most difficult thing was trying to get the last three states that did
not ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. We still want to get it into our Constitution.
We aren't there yet. We are close, but not there.
- Be yourself. Don't just try to copy men. Actually, many men are afraid
to ever ask questions - but they would be happy to hear you ask them. I was
on a bank board once. I didn't understand as much as some of the old timers,
but by asking questions I found that the other bank board members learned,
too, and would thank me afterwards.
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