Elizabeth Edwards

Background

The daughter of a decorated Navy pilot, Mary Elizabeth Anania was born July 3, 1949. In her early years, she attended school in Japan, where her father was stationed. She was an English major at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She graduated from UNC Law School in May 1977, and married John Edwards that year. Edwards is an accomplished attorney, she clerked with a U.S. district court judge in Norfolk, Virginia. She worked for the North Carolina Attorney General’s Office in the early 1980s. For 12 years, she worked at a Raleigh law firm, and taught legal writing as an adjunct professor at UNC Law School. She volunteered with parent teacher associations at her children's schools and was active in their youth soccer leagues. In 1996, she and John Edwards established the Wade Edwards Foundation, helping to build a computer learning center called the Wade Edwards Learning Lab in Raleigh in honor of their late son. She toured the country sharing her experience with cancer and loss of a child. Her other book is called Resilience: Reflections on the Burdens and Gifts of Facing Life's Adversities (2010). She died in her home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in 2010. This past speaker page shares her podium presentation as well as the Q&A.