Patricia Roberts Harris (1924-1985) became the first African American woman in the Cabinet when President Jimmy Carter appointed her secretary of housing and urban development in 1977.

Born on May 31, 1924, in Mattoon, Illinois, to working class parents, Patricia Roberts Harris exemplified a true American success story. Educated in the Chicago public schools, Harris attended Howard University in Washington, D.C., where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated summa cum laude in 1945. While at Howard, she served as vice-president of a student chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and led a demonstration which helped integrate a white restaurant located in a black section of Washington, D.C.

After graduation Harris returned to Chicago and pursued graduate studies in industrial relations at the University of Chicago. During this time she also worked as program director of the local Young Women's Christian Association. In...