When Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland was little, her parents took her to a movie about chemist and physicist Marie Curie. Thus began her lifelong love of science. Later she got a chemistry set and imagined herself winning two Nobel Prizes. But she was clumsy in the lab, so she switched to debate and drama, then became a social worker.
Once elected to the House of Representatives, Mikulski says, “I figured if I wasn’t going to develop the cure for cancer, discover a planet, or develop a tsunami warning system, I could be on the committees that support all of this.”
Although Mikulski—elected to the Senate in 1986—is committed to medical research, her true love is space.
“I’d be a Trekkie in two hot seconds,” she says. But she admits a more realistic job would be an astronomer.
“While I would love to go up to the distant planets and find new galaxies,” she says, “I wouldn’t want to be an astronaut. I don’t quite see myself in the costume.”
Nancy Doyle Palmer is a DC writer whose fantasy is to be a backup singer with Kool and the Gang.
This article appears in our October 2005 issue of Washingtonian.
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Barbara Mikulski: "I’d be a Trekkie in two hot seconds."
Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski is leaving her post in 2016. Perhaps, a career in astronomy is next?
When Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland was little, her parents took her to a movie about chemist and physicist Marie Curie. Thus began her lifelong love of science. Later she got a chemistry set and imagined herself winning two Nobel Prizes. But she was clumsy in the lab, so she switched to debate and drama, then became a social worker.
Once elected to the House of Representatives, Mikulski says, “I figured if I wasn’t going to develop the cure for cancer, discover a planet, or develop a tsunami warning system, I could be on the committees that support all of this.”
Although Mikulski—elected to the Senate in 1986—is committed to medical research, her true love is space.
“I’d be a Trekkie in two hot seconds,” she says. But she admits a more realistic job would be an astronomer.
“While I would love to go up to the distant planets and find new galaxies,” she says, “I wouldn’t want to be an astronaut. I don’t quite see myself in the costume.”
Nancy Doyle Palmer is a DC writer whose fantasy is to be a backup singer with Kool and the Gang.
This article appears in our October 2005 issue of Washingtonian.
Don’t Miss Another Big Story—Get Our Weekend Newsletter
Our most popular stories of the week, sent every Saturday.
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