Huffington Post – CHICAGO — Cardiss Collins, the first African-American woman to represent Illinois in Congress, died of complications from pneumonia at a Virginia hospital, according to a family friend.

Mel Blackwell said this week that Collins died Sunday evening at a hospital in Alexandria, Va., after suffering a stroke and spending time in a nursing home.

“She was a groundbreaking congresswoman,” Blackwell said.

Collins originally was elected to fill the seat left vacant when her husband, Congressman George W. Collins, who represented what was then the 7th District, was killed in a 1972 airplane crash. In 1994, the last year she ran for office, she was re-elected with 79 percent of the vote.

Chicago Democratic Rep. Danny Davis, who succeeded Collins, said that during her more than 24 years in Congress, Collins led efforts to curtail credit fraud against women, advocated gender equity in college sports and worked to reform federal child care facilities. She chaired the Government Activities and Transportation Sub-Committee.

Cardiss Hortense Robertson was born in St. Louis, Mo., on Sept. 24, 1931, before her family moved to Detroit. She attended Northwestern University and was a secretary, accountant and auditor for the Illinois Department of Revenue before she entered politics.

In 1958 she married George Washington Collins and campaigned with him in his races for alderman and Democratic Party ward committeeman. They had one son, Kevin.

In 1970, George Collins won a special election to fill a U.S. House seat made vacant by the death of Rep. Daniel J. Ronan.

Shortly after winning a second term in Congress, George Collins was killed in a plane crash near Chicago’s Midway Airport.