Arlen Specter has built a record over the last 24 years in the Senate that has intermittently angered and thrilled Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals. He has been unafraid of bucking his party leaders but has also provoked the wrath of women's rights groups.

Now Specter mounts his campaign for a historic fifth term, banking on his outspoken moderate stances and a record of delivering federal projects and money back to the Keystone State.

Many commentators have been perplexed by Specter. While he generally sides with pro-choice voters and recently authored a letter with Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, calling on an end to the ban on embryonic stem-cell research, he also voted to ban a late-term abortion technique in 2003. A longtime supporter of many pro-women issues, he angered many with his harsh questioning of Anita Hill during Clarence Thomas' Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

A facile student and talented lawyer, Specter has often relied on his brains and verbal brawn, more than his personal charisma, to gain power and win reelection.

"No one will ever use the word 'Specter' and 'beloved' in the same sentence. No one gets up in the morning and says 'Gee, I'm having lunch with Arlen Specter' and look forward to it," said G. Terry Madonna, of Franklin and Marshall College's Center for Politics and Public Affairs.

Despite this, he has built a storied career unparalleled in modern Pennsylvania politics.

Specter was born in Wichita, Kan., on Feb. 12, 1930, but spent most of his childhood years in the rural town of Russell, Kan. He excelled in school, riding his scholarship east to Pennsylvania.

Specter first arrived in the Quaker State as a college student in 1947 when he attended the University of Pennsylvania. In 1951, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa from UPenn with a Bachelor's degree in international relations. Immediately after completing his college degree, Specter followed his father's footsteps into the military, entering the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War. He served until 1953, attaining the rank of first lieutenant.

Following his tour, Specter obtained his law degree at Yale Law School in 1956. While at Yale, he excelled academically, earning a spot on the board of editors for the highly prestigious Yale Law Journal.

After completing his law degree and passing the bar exam, Specter soon began a meteoric rise as a prosecutor, taking a job as an assistant district attorney in Philadelphia in 1959. While an assistant DA, Specter was appointed assistant counsel to the Warren Commission, set up to investigate the assassination of President Kennedy. It was in that role he established the "single bullet theory," which concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald had been the sole gunman in Dallas that day. His participation on the commission thrust him into the public spotlight and reportedly helped fuel his ambition to run for public office.

Although he returned to the Philadelphia DA office after the commission, Specter was soon planning his runs for public office. He switched parties to become a Republican and ran for district attorney in 1965, winning election despite the city's strong Democratic voter base. He won reelection in 1969, but then was ousted in 1973.

After his defeat in 1973, he returned to private practice, but also set his sights beyond the city of brotherly love. In 1976, he mounted his first run for statewide office, running for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, losing to rising political star and condiment heir John Heinz. Undeterred, Specter ran for the GOP gubernatorial nomination, this time losing to Richard Thornburgh, who went on to serve as governor until 1987.

In another tough primary, Specter beat a former state party chairman, 36 percent to 33 percent, to win the 1980 Republican nomination for U.S. Senate. Helped by the tide of Republican voting that swept Ronald Reagan into office, he eked out a narrow win, garnering 50 percent of the vote, compared with 48 percent for the Democrat.

As senator, Specter passed legislation in the areas of education, health, veterans' rights and terrorism. His position as chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that oversees the National Institutes of Health, he directed more funding to medical research to find cures and treatments for Parkinson's Disease, cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer's, to create new jobs in the health sector, and to combat school violence by treating it as a national health problem.

Specter has also focused on veterans. His father, Harry Specter, was wounded in World War I and later denied veterans aid, but as senator, Specter worked to protect and expand their rights. He also led the investigation into Gulf War Syndrome, despite some opposition within his party.

But his tenure in Washington has not been without controversy. Specter's aggressive questioning of Anita Hill in 1991 as she testified against Justice Clarence Thomas during his Supreme Court confirmation hearing angered many, some of whom accused Specter of being sexist and insensitive. Hill subsequently described feeling "ridiculed" by Specter's relentless questioning. The senator defended his questioning, but others saw his support of Thomas as an effort to redeem himself with conservatives angered that he opposed the appointment of staunch conservative Robert Bork to the Supreme Court in 1987.

Specter again entered murky waters when in 1999 he criticized the Republican Party for impeaching President Clinton as a result of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, a stance that was not very popular with many Republican leaders at the time. In a decision that he himself described as "a lot ambiguous, maybe even a little amorphous," Specter voted "not proven" in the impeachment trial.

During his work in the Senate, he has also faced several health scares. In 1993, Specter was diagnosed with a brain tumor and had to undergo brain surgery and radiation treatments in an effort to stave off the disease. Then in 1998, he had to endure double-bypass heart surgery, yet was able to return to work at the Senate only one month later.

With respect to the current war in Iraq, Specter voted to authorize the use of force against Iraq in 2002 and for the $87 billion appropriations bill that provided continued funding for the war in 2003. He also supported the 2004 defense spending bill that provided $401.3 billion for defense and national security to be used in paying benefits to retired and disabled military personnel as well as other defense-related items.

During his years he has also built his political support, surviving a close race in 1992 after women's groups mounted a campaign to oust him after the Anita Hill flap. By 1998, he cruised to a 26-point win. This year, he mounts a campaign to become the first senator to serve five terms from the state.

Specter lives in Philadelphia with his wife, Joan, a former four-time Philadelphia city councilwoman. He has two sons, Shanin and Steve, and is a grandfather to four children, Silvi, Perry, Lilli and Hatti.