Bertie Bowman, longest-serving African-American congressional staffer, dies at 92

(CNN) – Herbert “Bertie” Bowman, the longest-serving African-American congressional staffer in history who worked on Capitol Hill for more than 60 years, died Wednesday, according to a spokesperson for the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. He was 92.

According to his autobiography “Step by Step,” at 13, Bowman imagined Washington, DC could offer him a different path than his South Carolina family farm. He “fantasized” about a life “up the road,” where he could be lost in a bustling city. After a chance meeting with the late Democratic Sen. Burnet Maybank of South Carolina, his “fantasy became an obsession,” he wrote.

Bowman forged friendships with presidents, worked his way from janitorial staff to the Senate floor and made history with the longevity of his unprecedented career, according to his autobiography. From stair-sweeping, Bowman climbed the staff ranks, eventually finding a home in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – one of the most powerful committees within Congress – in the 1960s as a clerk.

Bowman first announced his retirement from the committee in 1990, though he told C-Span he continued to work on and off the payroll. But Bowman didn’t retire for long. When former Sen. Jesse Helms, a North Carolina Republican, assumed the chair of the committee, he told Bowman he wanted him to return as his hearing coordinator, Bowman told C-Span in 2008.

Asked by C-Span how he could consider lawmakers who opposed civil rights legislation as friends, Bowman said, “Anytime you have someone that’s going to do things for you or ready to help you when you’re in need and stick by, that’s one reason why I call them my friend.”

Bowman wrote in his memoir that he “never discussed with Senator Helms the terrible things he said about Blacks.”

Bowman’s…