"It's all right," Hillary Rodham Clinton assured a friend, a fellow Arkansan who was shocked by the reception. "Someday they'll understand.''
Slowly, many critics did: Teacher tests and higher academic standards pushed in 1983 by Mrs. Clinton and then-Gov. Bill Clinton modestly improved Arkansas schools.
Mrs. Clinton, who chaired the panel that recommended overhauling the state's education system, returned Tuesday to her adopted home state and promoted her husband's latest stab at school reforms - this time on the national level.
The trip was part of a broad, long-term strategy to polish Mrs. Clinton's public image; she wants the general public, even her harshest critics, to understand her better.
On a sunny, spring-like day, the first lady viewed tornado damage, delivered an address on school standards, toured a children's hospital and discussed a scholarship program for single parents.
She stood beneath the tattered remnants of an awning stuck high in an uprooted tree and consoled tornado victims in Benton, Ark.
"I'm terrified," said Shari Dunn, whose mother- and father-in-law were killed by a twister that left their trailer park a pile of lumber, metal and debris.
"How could you not be?" Mrs. Clinton asked.
In a speech to school administrators, Mrs. Clinton forcefully supported her husband's call for standardized testing that would measure students against world standards. It would allow "local districts and states to take an honest stock of themselves," Mrs. Clinton told school administrators.
Later, at the single-parent scholarship event, Mrs. Clinton said the new welfare legislation requires the private sector to help welfare recipients get on their feet. "With the president's signature on welfare reform, we no longer have a national safety net. We have a big challenge ahead of us," she said.
The first lady also toured an Arkansas Children's Hospital neonatal unit that she helped establish 17 years ago - while pregnant with daughter Chelsea. Gazing through an incubator at a spindly premature baby, Mrs. Clinton joked, "She looks like E.T."
Her 18-hour schedule reflected a new effort to blend the soft-and-fuzzy traditional first lady appearances with nuts-and-bolts policy and political discussions that befit a major White House player.
It also underscored Mrs. Clinton's plan to remain a clear, if somewhat muted, voice for her pet issues: schools, health care, Gulf War illnesses, welfare, the District of Columbia, and credit for tiny businesses.
She remains actively engaged in policy, as evidenced by her appearance at a Cabinet-level meeting on education last week, but the advocacy will remain low-key. She still remembers the harsh criticism of her failed attempt to overhaul the nation's health care system.
Her travel schedule will be heavy, including a trip this month to Africa. And she hopes more frequent contact with reporters will give her views a more favorable hearing.
The Arkansas trip marked the first time a press corps joined Mrs. Clinton on a domestic visit. She conducted a rare round-table interview with journalists Monday, the second one this year.
The mass interview was designed to highlight her views on education reform, but reporters peppered Mrs. Clinton with questions about her role in administration scandals. Still, the forum cleared the air for her to focus Tuesday on education.
Aides say Mrs. Clinton has reluctantly determined that she must venture from her self-imposed cocoon to tackle tough questions if she wants to draw attention to her other projects.
On education, the first lady told reporters Monday that she does not fear uproar from conservatives who believe school standards jeopardize local autonomy.
"We just don't see it. It may burn up some radio talk-show hosts' phone lines," said Mrs. Clinton, who as first lady of Arkansas fought strong objections to teacher testing, tax increases for schools and fears of school consolidation.
Diane Blair, the University of Arkansas professor who accompanied Mrs. Clinton as she walked through that hostile gym crowd a decade or so ago, said the first lady is fighting a familiar battle.
"What strikes me is how consistent she has been in the types of things she advocates," Blair said.