Prime Minister Golda Meir, the Iron Lady of Israeli politics, played a fundamental role in establishing Israel as a country and guiding it through its difficult formative years. As an early proponent of Zionism, she moved to what was then British Palestine at the age of 23, and eventually rose to the fledgling state of Israel's highest office. Here are 11 facts about Israel's kindly grandma and political strategist.
1. SHE WAS BORN IN THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE AND RAISED IN MILWAUKEE.
Born Golda Mabovitch in 1898 in Kiev, Ukraine (then part of the Russian Empire), the future Israeli prime minister had a genuinely international upbringing. Her family escaped Russia during a time of increased anti-Jewish sentiment and widespread pogroms—violent mob persecutions of Jewish people—when she was eight years old. Her father, Moshe, left first; he initially sought work in New York City, but then landed in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he saved enough money to bring his family over, three years after he had arrived. Golda liked Milwaukee—she later wrote of being entranced by her "pretty new clothes, by the soda pop, and ice cream and by the excitement" of Schuster's Department Store.
