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Heard on the Hill: Happy 95th Birthday, Mrs. Boggs

Who says birthday parties are just for kids? Hitting 95 is also cause for celebration, especially if you have Louisiana roots.

Hill resident Jan Schoonmaker tells HOH that Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and her husband, Frank Snellings, hosted a birthday party at their Capitol Hill home Wednesday in honor of former Rep.-turned-Ambassador to the Vatican Lindy Boggs (D-La.).

Boggs, a feminist powerhouse who served in Congress for 18 years and has a room named in her honor just off the Rotunda, turned 95 that day.

Schoonmaker says attendees included House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) and Reps. John Dingell (D-Mich.), Norm Dicks (D-Wash.), Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) and Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) as well as NPR journalist Cokie Roberts, Boggs’ daughter.

Members dug into a fancy lunch, Louisiana-style. Our tipster says they dined on crawfish pie, spicy andouille gumbo and bananas foster, topping the party off with a layered Doberge birthday cake “flown up from New Orleans for the occasion.”

No word on whether balloons, cone-shaped party hats and birthday horns were part of the celebration.

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