MILWAUKEE—When Trisha Hope was a little girl, she sat next to her mother on a rattan couch at their Texas home, watching the Republican National Convention (RNC) on TV with wide-eyed wonder.
“I was just so enthralled with the costumes and the hats and all that,” Ms. Hope, now a few months shy of 61, said, recounting a memory that made a big impression on her 52 years ago.
After watching the 1972 GOP convention in Miami, which resulted in the nomination of President Richard Nixon for a second term, the little girl vowed to her mother, Irene Psencik, that she would become an RNC delegate someday….