09-12-2021 Hall of Fame - Flipbook - Page 34
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Baltimore Sun Media | Sunday, September 12, 2021
BALTIMORE SUN’S 2021
BUSINESS AND CIVIC HALL OF FAME HONOREE
JEANNE
D. HITCHCOCK
J
eanne D. Hitchcock may be the most influential woman in Baltimore with the fewest mentions in the city’s daily newspaper.
That’s not to suggest she’s not well known. After more than a
half-century of work — in law, at the NAACP and in government
service — her reputation among Maryland movers and shakers
as a woman to see is well established. But she’s not someone to
seek the limelight or to toot her own horn. Rather, she’s someone who advises, who negotiates, who solves problems and
who has proven particularly adept at matching talented people with jobs that
suit them. As former Gov. Martin O’Malley recalls, he never interviewed a candidate for a judgeship (one of the more consequential decisions of any governor)
without Jeanne Hitchcock in the room with him asking questions and mulling
over answers.
“She’s simply one of the most
capable people I’ve ever worked
with,” recalls Mr. O’Malley, who
first hired her as deputy mayor of
Baltimore and then appointments
secretary when he was elected
governor. “She was an awesome
public administrator for the toughest problems and for the long haul
of the daily regimen.”
Born at Johns Hopkins Hospital,
Jeanne is a Baltimorean through
and through. Her grandfather was a
caterer. Her father, Earl Dougherty,
worked for the Veterans Administration. And her late mother, who is
fondly remembered as “Miss Dorothy,” was a Renaissance woman who
went to college at age 50, after many
years as a housewife, to become a
librarian.
The family was also a wellknown presence at Sharp Street
United Methodist Church and on
the west side of the city generally.
Jeanne was raised on old-fashioned,
working-class values where dinner
was served promptly by 6 p.m. and
current events were certain to be
a topic of conversation over the
evening meal.
Education was prized in her
family. And so were civil rights.
They were friends with activist
Clarence M. Mitchell Jr. and his
BACKGROUND
Age: 75
Education: Booker T. Washington
Junior High School; Eastern High
School; B.A. in sociology, Morgan
State University; J.D., University of
Maryland School of Law
Hometown: Baltimore City
Current residence: Baltimore City
Career highlights: Assistant
social worker, Department of
Social Services; assistant attorney
general; managing partner, Fugett
and Hitchcock law firm; director of
urban market development at The
Southland Corporation in Dallas, Texas; chief operating officer of NAACP;
deputy mayor of Baltimore (19992007); secretary of appointments
to governor (2007-2015); governor’s
chief legislative officer (2014-2015);
special advisor to the vice-president
on local government and community
affairs at Johns Hopkins University
and Medicine (2015-present)
Civic and charitable activities:
College Bound board of directors,
chair of the board of the East
Baltimore Development Corporation, past board chair of the Mount
Auburn Cemetery
Family: Divorced. Two daughters,
seven grandchildren, three great
grandchildren
family. As a student at Booker T.
Washington Junior High, she once
toured the newly opened Social
Security Administration building in
Woodlawn and loudly asked why
all the African American workers
labored in the cafeteria and not in
the offices. Her teacher “flipped,”
as she recalls but Juanita Jackson
Mitchell, the first woman to pracice law in Maryland, later heard the
story at church and suggested she
had a future as a lawyer.
She did, but it was not a direct
route. After graduating from
Morgan State University with a
degree in sociology in 1968, Ms.
Hitchcock did a stint in social
services, married, had children
and eventually attended classes at
University of Maryland School of
Law.
Juggling kids and classes, she
finished in three straight years
and, after a fellowship at Legal
Aid, found herself advocating for
tenants rights in the era of lead paint
poisoning.
It was then she came to the attention of Stephen Sachs, Maryland’s
attorney general, who eventually
made her one of his top assistants
and later the office’s representative
in the State House. He remembers
taking her for a series of meetings
with Eastern Shore counties advising elected officials on the need to
create voting districts to increase
the likelihood of minority representation in their white, male-dominated county commissions and
town councils. She was not shy
about speaking up. “She’s a class act
and proudly assertive,” he recalls.
“She makes no apologies for her
outspokenness but she does it with
care.”
After that, there was a stint in
private practice and then a move
to Dallas, where she served as
manager of urban affairs for Southland Corporation of 7-Eleven fame.
She returned to Baltimore to help
Kweisi Mfume run the NAACP
before joining the O’Malley team in
City Hall and then, when the mayor
was elected governor, moving on to
serve as appointments secretary
and ultimately as chief legislative
officer.
“The word you should use to
describe Jeanne is ‘reliable,” insists
Larry S. Gibson, the influential
Baltimore Democratic activist
“She’s not only been
a trailblazer in this
community but her roles
have often been pivotal.
In public or private,
she’s the same person
— someone of integrity
and values. It’s an honor
to know her.”
— Michael Cryor, former state
Democratic Party chair who has
known Ms. Hitchcock since they
were teens.
and law professor. “Whatever she
agreed to do, you could always have
confidence that it would get done.”
In recent years, Jeanne has been
employed at The Johns Hopkins
University as a special advisor for
local government, community and
corporate affairs. She expected to be
at least semi-retired by now, but the
Freddie Gray incident and its aftermath in 2015, along with concerns
about policing on and off campus,
kept her fully engaged.
She is well suited to the challenge.
Her office is in the former Eastern
High School, which she attended
as a teen. Like so many of her jobs,
she works to bring people together,
to improve the lives of Baltimore’s
African American community and,
perhaps most important of all, she
does not walk away from a challenge.
That’s a quality she learned back
in her youth when her mother
insisted she attended a YWCA
camp so that she might help desegregate it. She cried for “two weeks,”
but she did it.
“Don’t forget that Jeanne is a
caregiver, a mom and grandmother.
She’s one of the most deep-feeling
people I know,” says Michael Cryor,
the former state Democratic Party
chair who has known her since they
were teens.
“She’s not only been a trailblazer
in this community but her roles
have often been pivotal. In public
or private, she’s the same person —
someone of integrity and values. It’s
an honor to know her.”