Lucy Thurman

Lucy Thurman (October 22, 1849 – March 29, 1918) was a national temperance lecturer from Jackson, Michigan.

Biography Lucinda "Lucy" Smith was born on October 22, 1849, in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada to Nehemiah Henry Smith and Katherine Campbell. In 1866, she left home at 17 when she met Frederick Douglass and Dr. William Wells Brown in Rochester, New York. With their help, she began teaching at a school in Maryland. She moved to Jackson, Michigan in 1869 and married Henry William Simpson. She remarried after Simpson's death to Frank Thurman in 1883. In 1898, she cofounded the Michigan Association of Colored Women's Clubs with friend Mary Eleanora McCoy and served as its first president. The new organization was under the umbrella of the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs (NACWC) and was dedicated to welfare, rights, and education of black women and families. Under her leadership, she helped to establish a Temperance Department, passed resolutions and actively worked in support of anti-lynching campaigns, juvenile courts, and the National Association for the Protection of Colored Women and Girls.

Death and legacy Thurman died in Jackson, Michigan on March 29, 1918.