Joan Lee Husted was one of the founders of the Hawai‘i State Teachers Association, its chief labor negotiator and the face of the union for more than three decades.

She died Monday at her Makiki home under hospice care at age 85, her family said.

In a post on the HSTA web site, the union said, “Husted’s legendary prowess as a shrewd negotiator and tireless teacher advocate” created a strong foundation for the union that continues beyond her three decades-plus service to the union.

“It is with heavy hearts that the HSTA community mourns the loss of our longtime and fierce advocate for thousands of public educators in Hawaii,” HSTA President Osa Tui Jr. said.

“With the bravery of a lion, Joan was fearless in taking on the Department of Education, be it across the negotiating table or over the airwaves. Our educators today have so much to be thankful to Joan for as we benefit from the wins she secured during her decades of service to HSTA,” Tui said.

Jan Turner, who worked with Husted on the HSTA Negotiations Committee for 15 years, said her colleague was a powerful weapon at the bargaining table.

“Tens of thousands of Hawaii teachers are the direct beneficiaries of her legacy, a legacy which I suspect will never be matched. There will never be another Joan,” she said.

After growing up and starting her career in Michigan, Husted landed in Hawaii, joining the newly opened King Intermediate School in Kaneohe as a counselor in 1966. She later served as a district resource teacher for Windward Oahu.

When the folks who were organizing a new teachers union in the early ’70s found out she had collective bargaining experience, she was asked to help out.

“We couldn’t ask for anyone better to bring about the changes that were needed,” said Odetta Fujimori, HSTA founding president.

Husted joined the HSTA staff in 1973 and would go on to become HSTA’s chief negotiator, achieving 15 collective bargaining agreements for teachers. She would eventually become deputy executive director and its first female executive director, serving for seven years.

After 36 years with the union, she retired at the end of 2007 at age 70.

But Husted wasn’t done. She joined the Hawaii Education Association board and served in leadership roles as executive committee member and chairperson of the personnel committee. She also served as president of HEA’s insurance corporation and vice president of the Education Institute of Hawaii.

Husted’s influence also extended nationally as a commissioner on the Education Commission of States, a member of National Education Association committees and the American Arbitration Association.

“Her friendship, her intellect, and her fierce advocacy for Hawai‘i’s teachers, educators, schools and, most especially, Hawaii’s schoolchildren, will live on in the hearts of those influenced by her tireless efforts,” Joan Lewis, HEA’s president, said in a statement.

Former HSTA and HEA president June Motokawa said, “I have so much love and respect for that woman, that leader.”

Motokawa said Husted’s legacy in education is based on her tireless efforts as a progressive advocate for teachers. As a labor leader, Husted was especially skilled in negotiations and she could recite education and collective bargaining laws from memory.

“For Joan it wasn’t just about salary and working conditions, it was for the whole teacher,” she said.

A 2008 MidWeek story published just after Husted’s retirement said she was often recognized in the supermarket checkout line as “the strike lady.”

In the early 1970s, HSTA became the first public employee union to use its new striking power to defy then-Gov. John Burns, which made Husted the target of much criticism.

Turner, the negotiating committee colleague, said Husted had a gift of making every teacher she interacted with feel heard and supported, and she brought that support to the bargaining table.

“With her steel trap mind of remembering facts and history, was she ever a force to be reckoned with at the bargaining table,” she said. “I remember frequently being asked what happens in bargaining … answer: Joan happens!”

Husted is survived by her daughter, Tina (Rodney) Lacy of Makiki, as well as a grandson, granddaughter and great-grandson, and brother Harry Robert Husted of Texas.

Plans for a memorial serv­ice are pending.