Betty Castor's run for the U.S. Senate is just the latest challenge the 63-year-old hopes to conquer.

She grew up in New Jersey, born and raised in the town of Glassboro, where her father served as mayor. She graduated from Glassboro State University in 1962 and headed out into the world to face the first of many tests of her stamina and intellect.

Castor headed for Uganda to work as a schoolteacher. While there she accomplished one of what would become many firsts: leading a group of her students up Mt. Kilimanjaro as part of the first all-women team to climb the summit. Friends have described the ascent as life-changing, and Castor herself said that it was emblematic of her belief that life should be a "journey of challenges."

Upon her return to the United States, she moved to Florida, earning her Master's degree in education at the University of Miami in 1968.

Castor was not a Floridian long before she entered the family business of local politics. She ran and became the Hillsborough county commissioner in 1972, helping run the county in the Tampa area. Within four years, Castor had been elected chairwoman of the commission. Also in 1976, Castor ran for state senator and won, representing part of central Florida in Tallahassee.

Castor soon eyed statewide office, mounting a campaign in 1978 for Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor. But it was this race that handed her her first defeat at the hands of Bob Graham, the same man she is now hoping to replace in the U.S. Senate when he retires this fall. Graham is now Castor's most important political ally, having endorsed her early in the primary race and going on the offensive for her against Democratic and Republican opponents alike.

Undeterred by the loss, she won reelection in 1982 and soon rose to become the first female president pro tempore of the Florida Senate in 1985. One year later, Castor became the Florida commissioner of Education, perhaps her most widely recognized political experience thus far. Castor often cites her work as the head of Florida's public schools as evidence of her ability to be an effective, consensus-building moderate. Castor has said, "As education commissioner, I was able to work across party lines" to raise teacher salaries and introduce initiatives to partner businesses with local schools.

During this period, Florida's schools saw neither significant improvement nor decline, but Castor's work leading one of the largest school systems in the country did earn her an appointment to the presidency of the University of South Florida, an unusual opportunity for someone without a doctoral degree. Castor's supporters credit her stewardship with USF growing into a major research university in recent years.

But her tenure at the university was not without scandal. In 1996, USF computer engineering professor Sami al-Arian, a Palestinian raised in Kuwait, was investigated by the FBI for suspected ties to anti-Israeli groups labeled by the U.S. government as terrorist organizations. Al-Arian admitted giving financial support to Palestinian organizations but denied any illegal activity. While the investigation was pending, Castor decided to put al-Arian on paid leave.

Discussing the incident with a roundtable of reporters this spring, Castor said, "For three years, I got not one iota of information. … Finally, I wrote to the federal authorities and said, after he'd been on the payroll for three years, 'Can you give me a reason why he shouldn't be able to stay there?' They wrote back and said 'No.'" In 1999, Castor allowed al-Arian back on campus, claiming that tenure rules prevented her from taking any other action.

Federal authorities resumed their investigation into al-Arian after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, indicting him for a leadership role in the terror and suicide-bomber network Islamic Jihad. USF fired al-Arian before the FBI arrested him in February of 2003, and he is still being held without bail under the charges.

Although Castor left the university in 1999, her connection with the case was fodder for debate in the primary. Her chief rival in the primary, U.S. Rep. David Deutsch, challenged the "not one iota" remark, and repeatedly criticized Castor over the al-Arian affair.

Television ads financed by a supporter of Deutsch said that Castor saw search warrants for al-Arian, and claimed that that information should have been enough to prompt Castor to personally confront the professor.

To respond to the Section 527 group's ads criticizing her handling of al-Arian, Castor's campaign released a statement, "The real question is, who are the people behind Deutsch's secretly financed project?"

Castor's own influx of cash was a point of contention in the primary as well. Her campaign funds were not competitive with Deutsch's until she received $1.7 million from the national group Emily's List, which works to get pro-choice women elected. Running against two pro-choice men, some questioned the fairness of Castor's gender-based advantage.

In an early campaign ad, Castor touted her femininity, saying, "Long before I became a legislator or a university president, I was a teacher, I was a wife, I was a mother. So family values come naturally to me. And those are the kind of values I'll take to the United States Senate."

Once divorced, Castor is married to lobbyist and former state legislator Sam Bell and has six children and 10 grandchildren.

From the beginning of her campaign, Castor has enjoyed support from powerful friends. Janet Reno, former Florida gubernatorial candidate and U.S. attorney general, announced her support for Castor in December of 2003. After her closely watched primary win on Sept. 1, Castor quickly appeared onstage with both of Florida's U.S. senators at an American Legion event, promising to fight for Veterans' health benefits. Ben Nelson and Graham declared she was an "independent voice," squarely focusing their criticism on the close ties to President Bush enjoyed by her Republican competitor in the general election, Mel Martinez.

Castor's campaign hopes to portray Martinez as an arch conservative, capitalizing on remarks he made in the Republican primary. Some Democrats such as State Attorney Harry Shorstein, however, have said that Martinez's competitor in the Republican primary, Bill McCollum, would have made a more "stark contrast" to Castor's moderate politics, though Duval County Democratic Chairman Clyde Collins is confident that Castor can win if she reaches out "to independents and Republicans that have followed her in the past as commissioner of education."

With the Democratic stronghold of central Florida and Castor's Tampa hometown apparently locked in her favor, Castor hopes to attract African American supporters. In addition, recognizing that Martinez may enjoy most of southern Florida's Cuban vote, "We'll be going after younger-generation Cubans and non-Cuban Hispanics," she said. "I think that's a community I can penetrate."

Castor's overriding theme in the election has been her balanced political views. She says she would have voted for the war in Iraq based on the evidence at the time, and vows to address prescription drug costs. She freely admits her role model is Bob Graham, known for their moderate politics and his past leadership of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

The 2004 race is the first one Castor has entered since 1990, but her career in Florida politics has lasted three decades. After a comfortable win in the primary, she faces one of the closest of the nation's 34 Senate races on Nov. 2.

-- Compiled for the Online NewsHour by Molly Farrell