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0 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? e-edition | subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW Our View: Court issues civics lesson to school district ... State, miners headed for showdown over dredging ... Jacksonville to add downtown parking spots ... Our View: Court issues civics lesson to school district ... State, miners headed for showdown over dredging ... Jacksonville to add downtown parking spots ... Edward Brooke, 1st black elected US senator, dies BOSTON — Former U.S. Sen. Edward W. Brooke, a liberal Republican who became the first black in U.S. history to win popular election to the Senate, died Saturday. He was 95. Comment By The Associated Press MailTribune.com By The Associated Press Posted Jan. 3, 2015 at 4:57 PM By The Associated Press Posted Jan. 3, 2015 at 4:57 PM » Social News BOSTON — Former U.S. Sen. Edward W. Brooke, a liberal Republican who became the first black in U.S. history to win popular election to the Senate, died Saturday. He was 95. Brooke died of natural causes at his Coral Gables, Florida, home, said Ralph Neas, Brooke's former chief counsel. Brooke was surrounded by his family. Brooke was elected to the Senate in 1966, becoming the first black to sit in that branch from any state since Reconstruction and one of nine blacks who have ever served there — including Barack Obama. Brooke told The Associated Press he was "thankful to God" that he lived to see Obama's election. And the president was on hand in October 2009 when Brooke was presented with the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest award Congress has to honor civilians. Obama hailed Brooke as "a man who's spent his life breaking barriers and bridging divides across this country." Incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recalled his first impression of the newly elected senator when McConnell was a Senate staffer and described Brooke as "a model of courage and honesty in office." "... even from across the Senate chamber, you could sense that this was a Senator of historic importance," the Kentucky Republican said in a statement Saturday. "Indeed, he was." A Republican in a largely Democratic state, Brooke was one of Massachusetts' most popular political figures during most of his 12 years in the Senate. Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick, the state's first black governor, remembered Brooke for his unselfish public service. "He carried the added honor and burden of being 'the first' and did so with distinction and grace," Patrick said. "I have lost a friend and mentor. America has lost a superb example of selfless service." Brooke earned his reputation as a Senate liberal in part by becoming the first Republican senator to publicly urge President Richard Nixon to resign. He helped lead the forces in favor of the Equal Rights Amendment and was a defender of school busing to achieve racial integration, a bitterly divisive issue in Boston. He also lent his name to the Brooke amendment to the federal housing act, passed in 1969, which limited to 25 percent the amount of income a family must pay for rent in public housing. However, late in his second term, Brooke divorced his wife of 31 years, Remigia, in a stormy proceeding that attracted national attention. Repercussions from the case spurred an investigation into his personal finances by the Senate Ethics Committee and a probe by the state welfare department and ultimately cost him the 1978 election. He was defeated by Democrat Rep. Paul E. Tsongas. Tsongas' widow, U.S. Rep. Nikki Tsongas, said Saturday that Brooke's career was "as courageous as it was historic." In a Boston Globe interview in 2000, Brooke recalled the pain of losing his bid for a third term. "It was just a divorce case. It was never about my work in the Senate. There was never a charge that I committed a crime, or even nearly committed a crime," Brooke said. In 2008, pioneering newswoman Barbara Walters said she had an affair with the then-married Brooke in the 1970s, but it ended before he lost the 1978 election. She called him "exciting" and "brilliant." Brooke received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in a White House ceremony in 2004. Five years later, when Brooke received the congressional honor in Washington, he cited the issues facing Congress — health care, the economy and the wars overseas — and called on lawmakers to put their partisan differences aside. 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