[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 29 (Thursday, February 28, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Page S1001]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        TRIBUTE TO DIANNE JONES

  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I rise today to pay tribute to a friend 
and exceptional Illinoisan who recently passed away.
  In 1949, a young woman from New York moved to Chicago to attend 
college at Roosevelt University. Her name was Dianne Jones, and she 
stayed for the next 63 years.
  After graduating from Roosevelt, Dianne decided she wanted to teach, 
and she began planting her roots in the civil rights and labor 
communities. Along with her husband Linzey, she fought for civil rights 
and equality by helping to organize two Chicago-area chapters of the 
NAACP. Dianne then led the successful effort to desegregate the city's 
Rainbow Beach, and she even attended the 1963 March on Washington where 
Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous ``I Have a Dream'' speech.
  As a teacher, Dianne established herself as an advocate for educators 
and children by helping to found one of the first teachers unions in 
Illinois. She later served as that union's local president, as well as 
vice president of the Illinois Federation of Teachers. As a teacher and 
an advocate, Dianne spent her life fighting to promote equality, 
justice, civil rights and education in Illinois. And she enjoyed it.
  Once, when asked about her career, Dianne said, ``Everyone should get 
to work at what they would volunteer to do.''
  Dianne Jones was one of the lucky people who got to do just that. 
Those roots that she planted 50 years ago have continued to grow and 
multiply ever since.

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