[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 74 (Monday, June 12, 2006)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1117-E1118]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     PAYING TRIBUTE TO BILLIE BATES

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. JON C. PORTER

                               of nevada

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, June 12, 2006

  Mr. PORTER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Billie Bates, who was 
recently honored in Boulder City, Nevada with a mayoral proclamation 
naming the 13th of May Billie Bates Day.
  Mrs. Bates, who is now in her 94th year, was born and raised in 
Aldrich, Missouri. At the age of 24, while working as a school teacher, 
Billie met and married Russell Bates in July of 1936. In 1942, Billie, 
her husband, and her two children, Cornelia and Laurel Jean, moved to 
Boulder City, Nevada.
  While working on the Hoover Dam Project, Billie's husband was injured 
and Billie had to return to the workforce. Billie began work for the 
Bureau of Reclamation and became the longest serving executive 
secretary in the local bureau's history. She served underneath six

[[Page E1118]]

different Hoover Dam project managers in her 30 years of employment, 
and retired in 1975.
  Upon retirement, she became a champion for women's rights. Billie, 
along with the late Nevada women's rights activist Jean Ford, formed a 
non-profit organization in 1994. In 2005, the group was responsible for 
getting the statue of Northern Paiute Sarah Winnemucca placed in the 
hall of the United States Capitol building.
  Mr. Speaker, I am honored to recognize Mrs. Billie Bates on the floor 
of the House. I commend her for her contributions to Boulder City and 
continued service to the women's rights movement of southern Nevada.

                          ____________________