[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 6]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 8750-8751]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


       HONORING THE 100TH BIRTHDAY OF MRS. ALICE NICHOLSON MADURO

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. JERROLD NADLER

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 14, 2016

  Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a fiercely determined 
and independent woman, Mrs. Alice Nicholson Maduro, whose 100th 
birthday is July 8, 2016.
  Four years before women gained the right to vote, and 100 years 
before a woman first earned the nomination to become the President of 
the United States, Mrs. Maduro was born in New York City on July 8, 
1916 to Leone ``Claudine'' Gensollin of Menton, France, and Walter 
Curtis Nicholson of New York State.
  Since the grade-schooler Alice Nicholson favored her French mother's 
pronunciation of her first name, she began to spell it with a ``y''

[[Page 8751]]

instead of an ``i'' (Alyce, pronounced ``Aleeece''). The Nicholsons 
were a hardworking family, raising their children in modest 
circumstances. When Alyce's school-headmaster father died an early 
death, he left the family with few means and thus Alyce with little 
opportunity for higher education. However, this determined young woman 
was irrepressible and Alyce thrived as a reporter at the Summit New 
Jersey Herald, editorial assistant at McGraw Hill publications, and 
executive within the Information & Media Division of the ``Marshall 
Plan'' in Paris after the Second World War. From Paris, Alyce returned 
to the United States to work at Radio Free Asia in San Francisco, CA.
  When Denis Brandon Maduro, Esq. met this intelligent, international, 
beautiful woman during her east coast visit he fell in love 
instantaneously. He proposed to her promptly and, in the face of her 
reticence, lovingly encouraged her to extend her trip indefinitely. The 
two married two and one-half months later, on August 1, 1953, and 
yielded three offspring, Denis Brandon Maduro, Jr., Timothy Nicholson 
Maduro, and Peter Nicholson Maduro.
  As mother and wife, Mrs. Maduro devoted herself to making a home for 
her family until her husband Denis Sr.'s untimely death in 1967. Left 
alone to financially support her three boys, she needed to return to 
work. Constitutively industrious, Mrs. Maduro became a successful 
residential real estate broker in Manhattan and maintained an active 
broker's license through her 98th year. She was also the head of the 
parents' association at Collegiate School of New York City (the oldest 
still-operating educational institution in this country) where her 
children were enrolled. In that role, she was charged to welcome former 
First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis into the ranks of the parents' 
activities since John F. Kennedy, Jr. was then also enrolled there as a 
grade-schooler. In this connection, Mrs. Madura's eldest boy, Denis, 
was hired to be ``big brother'' to John Jr. during the summer of 1970 
on the Onassis' Greek island summer home of Scorpios.
  By her two eldest sons, Mrs. Maduro is the beloved grandmother of 
Gabriela Balaz Maduro and Andrea Balaz Maduro, of Jacksonville, 
Florida, as well as Leah Lee Maduro and Kona Lee Maduro, of Pacific 
Palisades, California.
  Still ``sharp as a tack'' and always elegantly turned out, Mrs. 
Maduro lives completely independently on Manhattan's upper west side, 
eagerly follows the New York Ballet & Philharmonic, the Manhattan art 
scene, local and national politics and international current events. 
Moreover, she elects to take taxi cabs instead of the city bus or 
subway only when unduly constrained for time. Thrilled to witness an 
African American and now perhaps a woman lead our country as its chief 
executive, she hopes to live to the day when people of all genders, 
identities, ethnicities, origins and religions can achieve high-office 
without barrier or prejudice.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me today in paying tribute 
to an admirably ``tough cookie'' and an outstanding citizen of this 
great nation, Mrs. Alice Nicholson Maduro, in anticipation of her 100th 
birthday.

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