• Nancy Pelosi rose through the ranks of Congress to eventually become the first female House speaker.

• It was a monumental achievement for the California lawmaker and native daughter of Baltimore.

• And in many ways it was fueled by her early political instincts and her role as a full-time mother.

In many ways, Nancy Pelosi’s political ascent was no surprise.

Decades before Pelosi become the first female House speaker in US history, she was Nancy D’Alesandro, the daughter of the highly influential Thomas D’Alesandro Jr., who served as a Maryland congressman and then as mayor of Baltimore from 1947 to 1959.

Nancy D’Alesandro was born in Baltimore on March 26, 1940, the youngest of seven children (and the only girl) in an Italian-American family…