Columba Bush

Columba Bush (née Garnica Gallo; ; born August 17, 1953) is a Mexican-American philanthropist. As the wife of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, she served as the First Lady of Florida from 1999 to 2007. Early life Columba Garnica Gallo was born in the community of Arperos, in the city of León, Guanajuato, Mexico, the daughter of José María Garnica Rodríguez (1925–2013), a migrant worker and waiter from Arperos, Guanajuato, and Josefina Gallo Esquivel (born 1920), from León, who were married in February 1949. Columba's father emigrated to the United States in 1956 when she was 3 years old and her parents divorced in 1963. Following the departure of her father, Columba and her mother remained in León. Garnica attended Instituto Antonia Mayllen, a private Catholic school in the historic center of León. She met Jeb Bush in 1970 in León when she was 16 years old and he was 17. Bush was teaching English as a second language and assisting in the building of a school in the small nearby village of Ibarrilla as part of a class at Andover called Man and Society.