Helen
Lemme was born Frances Helen Renfrow to Eva Craig and Lee Augustus
Renfrow in Grinnell, Iowa, on February 25, 1904. She was the oldest of
six children and worked as a housekeeper to help her family
financially. As a student she once won an essay contest but was not
given the gold medal prize because of her race.
Lemme graduated
from Grinnell High School, receiving a $5 gold coin scholarship. She
began her university studies in 1923 at Fisk University in Nashville,
Tennessee, but in 1925 moved to the University of Iowa, a state
university, in Iowa City, where she studied science and biology and
served as the president of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.
Her
first position after graduation was as a teacher at Lander University
in Greenwood, South Carolina. After one year she returned to Iowa City
and on August 26, 1929, she married Allyn Lemme. She then accepted a
teaching position at Alabama State Teachers College located in
Montgomery, Alabama, which later became Alabama State College for
Negroes, and is now Alabama State University.
Lemme then
returned to Iowa City with the intention of obtaining a master's degree
but she was diverted and had a son, Lawrence, on July 31, 1931. She
later had another son, Paul, in 1935.
The Lemmes used their Iowa
City home at 603 S. Capitol Street to provide room and board to
African-American students at University of Iowa, who were not allowed
to live in dormitories until 1946. Duke Ellington once played at one of
her all-night house parties.
Lemme devoted her life to the
rights of African Americans and women, and she was an active member of
the Democratic Party. She served as a precinct committeewoman, a
delegate at state and county conventions, and member of the Democratic
Party Black Caucus. She also advocated for greater representation of
Black voters at the 1944 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Locally, Lemme was involved in the Human Rights Commission and the Iowa
City Area Council of Churches. She was elected President of the Iowa
City League of Women Voters in 1946 and Iowa City Woman of the Year in
1955. A few years later, she was the first Black woman in Iowa City to
be awarded the Best Citizen of the Year.
Along the way, Lemme began work as a laboratory research technician in
the Department of Internal Medicine.
Lemme died on December 15, 1968, from smoke inhalation in a fire in her
home.
(Source: Wikipedia)
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In
1970, a new elementary school in Iowa City was named Helen Lemme
Elementary School in her honor. This school went on to become one of
the best elementary schools in the city. In 1984, University
of
Iowa African-American graduate students founded the Helen Lemme Reading
club, to serve as both a forum for African Americans to discuss
literature by or about African Americans and a support group for
African-American students living in a predominantly white community.
(Source: en.Wikipedia.org)
Helen Lemme Elementary School
3100 E Washington Street
Iowa City, Iowa
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