Barbara Bush, First Lady during George H.W. Bush‘s administration from 1989 to 1993 and Second Lady during the Reagan Administration from 1981 to 1989, has passed away at age 92.

She pushed for literacy in her public appearances, after discovering her son Neil’s dyslexia. She believed that through improving literacy rates, that the number of those homeless, would decrease. She described literacy as “the most important issue we have”. She became involved with many literacy organizations, served on literacy committees and chaired many reading organizations. Eventually, she helped develop the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy. Even after her role as First Lady ended, she still pushed for literacy to be the number one educational need.

She was extremely popular, more so than her predecessor, Nancy Reagan who passed in 2016 and even her successor, Hillary Clinton, due to her backing away from politics and controversial issues such as Nancy Reagan’s DARE program.  However, Mrs. Bush experienced many personal struggles throughout her life. For example, in 1953, her first daughter, Robin Bush  passed away from Leukemia at age three. It was after losing her daughter that Bush’s hair went permanently went white, becoming one of her signature looks.

During her role as First Lady, she exemplified what she thought the American values should be, kindness, concern for their fellow man and philanthropy. America was very fortunate to have a First Lady like Barbara Bush.