Elizabeth Dole, the newly elected senator from North Carolina, is truly a woman to watch. She grew up in a time and place when women were expected to support their husbands' careers at the expense of their individual ambitions, but she bucked the trend and established a professional life of her own. As the wife of Robert Dole, longtime Senate Majority Leader and Republican presidential candidate in 1996, she worked hard to support his campaign. On November 5, 2002, the couple reversed their roles, with Elizabeth at the microphone as the victorious candidate and Robert as the supportive spouse, waving to the crowd of supporters.

Elizabeth Dole spent her childhood in Salisbury, North Carolina, the daughter of a wealthy wholesale florist. She later attended Duke University, where she served as student body president. She graduated with honors, studied at Oxford University in England, and went on for her master's degree at Harvard. In 1965, she received a Harvard law degree, in 1965 as one of a very few women in her class of several hundred graduates.

Her professional career began when she took a job in Washington, D.C. working for the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare as a supporter of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society program. In those days, she was a Democrat, and she eventually worked in Johnson's White House in the Office of Consumer Affairs. Republican President Richard Nixon kept her on as Executive Director of the President's Committee for Consumer Interests and appointed her to the Federal Trade Commission. In 1975, she switched her party registration to the Republican Party. Under Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. Bush, Mrs. Dole became the only woman to serve as a Cabinet Secretary for two departments ­ Transportation from 1983 to 1987, and Labor from 1989 to 1990. From 1991 to 1995, she left government employment to serve as President of the American Red Cross.

After supporting her husband's unsuccessful bid for the White House in 1996, Elizabeth Dole decided to run for the presidency herself in 2000, but her campaign failed as Republicans turned to George W. Bush as their candidate. Not to be discouraged, Elizabeth Dole concentrated on the 2002 race for North Carolina's Senate seat vacated by retiring Senator Jesse Helms. She had early and strong support from President Bush, and she defeated Democrat Erskine Bowles by a margin of 54% to 45%.

Elizabeth Dole's remarkable career has taken an exciting turn, and as she takes office in the Senate, she joins a small but growing number of women senators, who also have beat the odds to reach positions once only held by men.