Topeka ? Julie Robinson became the state’s first black female federal district judge during a ceremony on Friday.

Robinson, who is also only the second woman to be confirmed in the federal District of Kansas’ 141-year history, said she was blessed by God in her life and career.

“You can think you earned things,” Robinson said. “(But) we all know that life is filled with uncertainty but also with good things, and those good things are blessings.”

After she was sworn in, she took her place at a temporary bench with six other federal district judges and Chief Judge Deanell Tacha of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Tacha, who was a law school professor for Robinson in 1978, administered the judicial oath to Robinson on Friday. Before her appointment to the federal district court, Robinson was a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge and a prosecutor in the U.S. attorney’s office in Kansas City, Kan.

An estimated 400 people, including family members, federal magistrates, members of the Kansas Supreme Court and Kansas Court of Appeals, several Shawnee County District Court judges, several U.S. Bankruptcy Court judges and other federal officials, attended Robinson’s installation.

Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., who was also at the ceremony, said Robinson was “incredibly qualified” for the district judge’s post and “has the mind and heart to be a judge of great calling.”