AUGUSTA – Georgette Berube, a long-time state legislator from Lewiston, was posthumously inducted into the Franco-American Hall of Fame during the Franco-American Day celebration held at the State House on Wednesday.

She was a champion for teaching the French language in Maine schools and a strong-willed lawmaker, said Rep. John Martin, D-Eagle Lake, who served with and became friends with Berube in the Legislature.

“Her work here was dictated by the question, ‘What will people back home think?'” Martin said.

Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston, who replaced Berube in the Senate when she retired, said Berube was a pioneer for women serving in the Legislature.

“She made it easier for us to see in our community that this was something women could do,” Rotundo said. “She taught many of us. I always hear her in the back of my mind (while serving on the Appropriations Committee) because she was very careful on fiscal issues and always wanted to know how the decisions she was making would impact people of Lewiston.”

Berube, a Democrat and Franco-American, had more legislative service than any other woman in Maine’s history. She ran for governor in 1982 in the Democratic primary against Joe Brennan.

Martin said she was quite often the top vote-getter in Lewiston in the era before districts when the top six candidates city-wide were awarded seats in the House.

She also hosted a French radio show in central Maine for many years. She died at the age of 77 in 2005.

Barry Rodrigue of Bath, a professor at the University of Southern Maine’s Lewiston-Auburn College, was also honored on Wednesday.

Rodrigue serves as the scholar for the University of Southern Maine’s Franco-American Collection and is the director of French North American Studies.