Politician, lawyer, and professor Barbara Jordan was an outspoken advocate for social equity. After two unsuccessful campaigns, Jordan won a seat in the Texas Senate in 1966. She became one of two African Americans elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1972. In 1976, she became the first African American woman to deliver a keynote address at the Democratic National Convention. Jordan retired from politics and became a professor, teaching even after she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and began using a wheelchair