COLUMBUS, Ohio (WKBN) – It takes a certain kind of person to stare down “wrong” and do what’s right.

Betty Sutton grew up in Barberton and is the youngest child of a boilermaker and a librarian.

She says she decided at a young age that life would be that of service and didn’t know it would be in politics.

Her parents played a big part of why she dedicated her life to doing what she does, according to Sutton.

During her first year of law school, her father was diagnosed with lung cancer. She made him a promise before he died that she would use her talents to help people like her parents.

But it was no easy task, and along the way, she faced misogyny on a level that would make your skin crawl.

The year after her father died, she started running for the Barberton City Council.

There had never been a woman on the council, and the powers that be told her that she was too young and she was too female.

She overcame all of that and was elected anyway She would rock the boat on the council when she called the mayor out for not including her when he addressed the “gentleman” of the City Council.

She would go on to be a state lawmaker and serve in the U.S. Congress.

No matter what she was able to accomplish, misogyny would rear its ugly head.

In 2010, a flyer was mailed to 15,000 people that read, “Let’s take Betty Sutton out of the House and put her back in the kitchen!”

She says despite the insult, she has continued to break barriers in male-dominated arenas, and she doesn’t have any plans of stopping anytime soon.You can read more about the other candidates for Ohio governor here. 

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