Rosalie Silber Abrams (June 2, 1916 — February 27, 2009) was a member of the

Maryland House of Delegates The Maryland House of Delegates is the lower house of the legislature of the State of Maryland. It consists of 141 delegates elected from 47 districts. The House of Delegates Chamber is in the Maryland State House on State Circle in Annapolis, ...

(1967–70) and

Maryland State Senate The Maryland Senate, sometimes referred to as the Maryland State Senate, is the upper house of the General Assembly, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Maryland. Composed of 47 senators elected from an equal number of constituent single-m ...

(1970-84). She was the first female and

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

majority leader of the state Senate (1978–82). Appointed by Governor

Harry Hughes Harry Roe Hughes (November 13, 1926 – March 13, 2019) was an American politician from the Democratic Party who served as the 57th Governor of Maryland from 1979 to 1987. Early life and family Hughes was born in Easton, Maryland, the s ...

, Abrams headed the Maryland Office on Aging (now Department of Aging) from 1983 until retiring in 1996.

Early life

Rosalie Silber was born to Dora (née Rodbell) and Isaac "Ike" Silber in

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore wa ...

on June 2, 1916. Her mother was an immigrant from

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

and her father an immigrant from

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. Her parents owned a bakery in East Baltimore called Silber's Bakery. She graduated from Western High School in the 1930s. She attended Sinai Hospital School of Nursing and became a

registered nurse A registered nurse (RN) is a nurse who has graduated or successfully passed a nursing program from a recognized nursing school and met the requirements outlined by a country, state, province or similar government-authorized licensing body to o ...

. She also attended

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

. She later attended

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...

and graduated with a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

in 1963 and a

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast t ...

in political science in 1969. Her master's thesis was ''State Governmental Structure Affecting Enactment and Implementation of a Federal Program: A Case Study of Medicaid in Maryland''.

Personal life

She married William Abrams in 1954. He died in 1978. Together, they had one daughter, Elizabeth "Lissa" Abrams.

Career

During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Abrams worked as a nurse in the

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

. She returned to work at Silber's Bakery in 1947 and worked there until she married in 1954. She also taught

sex education Sex education, also known as sexual education, sexuality education or sex ed, is the instruction of issues relating to human sexuality, including emotional relations and responsibilities, human sexual anatomy, sexual activity, sexual reproduc ...

classes at Patterson High School. Abrams was elected to the

in 1966 and served until 1970. Abrams represented Northwest Baltimore in the

from 1970 until 1984. In 1983, she was appointed by Governor

as the director of the Maryland Office of Aging. She served in that role until she retired in 1996.

Death

Abrams died of

heart failure Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome, a group of signs and symptoms caused by an impairment of the heart's blood pumping function. Symptoms typically include shortness of breath, excessive fatigue, ...

at Gilchrist Hospice Care in

Towson, Maryland Towson () is an unincorporated community and a census-designated place in Baltimore County, Maryland, United States. The population was 55,197 as of the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Baltimore County and the second-most populous unincor ...

on February 27, 2009.

References

1916 births 2009 deaths Politicians from Baltimore Columbia University School of Nursing alumni Johns Hopkins University alumni World War II nurses Democratic Party members of the Maryland House of Delegates Democratic Party Maryland state senators Women state legislators in Maryland 20th-century American politicians 20th-century American women politicians {{Maryland-politician-stub