View source for Essie Mae Washington-Williams

{{Short description|American school teacher and writer (1925–2013)}}
{{use mdy dates |date=May 2020}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Essie Mae Washington-Williams
| image              = Essie Mae Washington-Williams.jpg
| alt                = 
| caption            = Washington-Williams in 2003
| birth_date         = {{birth date|1925|10|12}}
| birth_place        = [[Edgefield, South Carolina]], U.S.
| death_date         = {{death date and age|2013|2|4|1925|10|12}}
| death_place        = [[Columbia, South Carolina]], U.S.
| birth_name         = Essie Mae Butler
|alias=Essie Mae Washington
| parents            = [[Strom Thurmond]] (father)<br />Carrie Butler (mother)
| spouse             = {{marriage|Julius T. Williams|1948|1964|end=d.}}
| children           = 4
| relatives          = [[James Strom Thurmond Jr.]] (half-brother)<br />[[Paul Thurmond]] (half-brother)
| education          = [[South Carolina State College]]<br />[[California State University, Los Angeles]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])<br />[[University of Southern California]] ([[M.Ed.|MEd]])
| occupation         = Teacher
}}

'''Essie Mae Washington-Williams''' ({{née}} '''Butler'''; October 12, 1925 – February 4, 2013) was an American teacher and author. She was the eldest child of [[Strom Thurmond]], [[governor of South Carolina]] and longtime [[United States Senate|United States senator]] known for his pro-[[racial segregation|segregation]] politics and for completing [[Strom Thurmond filibuster of the Civil Rights Act of 1957|the longest single-person Senate speech]] in opposition to the [[Civil Rights Act of 1957]], until [[Cory Booker's marathon speech|this record was broken in 2025 by Cory Booker]].<ref name="Janofsky">[https://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/16/national/16STRO.html?ex=1231218000&en=0509c5d87e66cd7a&ei=5070 Janofsky, Michael. "Thurmond Kin Acknowledge Black Daughter"], ''The New York Times'', December 16, 2004.</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2025-04-01 |title=Cory Booker makes longest Senate speech in 25-hour stand against Trump |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clyq24388ppo |access-date=2025-10-07 |website=BBC News |language=en-GB}}</ref> Of mixed race, she was born to Carrie Butler, a 16-year-old African-American girl who worked as a domestic servant for Thurmond's parents, and Thurmond, then 22 and unmarried. Essie Mae grew up in the family of one of her mother's sisters, not learning of her biological parents until 1938 when her mother came for a visit and informed Essie Mae she was her mother.<ref name="Dear Sen">Washington-Williams, Essie Mae (2005). Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond. Harper.</ref>{{rp|13}} She graduated from college, earned a master's degree, married, raised a family, and had a 30-year professional career in education.

Washington-Williams did not reveal her father's identity until she was almost 78 years old, after Thurmond's death at the age of 100 in 2003. Though he had little to do with her upbringing, he had paid for her college education and took an interest in her and her family all his life. In 2005, she published her autobiography, ''Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond'', which was nominated for the [[National Book Award]] and a [[Pulitzer Prize]].

==Early life==
Essie Mae was the daughter of Carrie Butler, who was 15 or 16 when her daughter was born, and [[Strom Thurmond]], then 22.<ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Crenshaw |first1=Kimberlé Williams |title=Was Strom a Rapist? |magazine=The Nation |date=26 February 2004 |url=https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/was-strom-rapist/ |access-date=1 November 2020 |issn=0027-8378}}</ref> Carrie Butler worked as a domestic servant for Thurmond's parents. Butler sent her daughter from [[South Carolina]] to her older sister Mary and her husband John Henry Washington to be raised in [[Coatesville, Pennsylvania]]. The girl was named Essie after another of Carrie's sisters, who fostered her briefly as an infant. Essie Mae grew up with her cousin, seven years older than she, who she believed was her half-brother.<ref>Gross, Terry (February 1, 2005). [https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4473680 {{"'}}Dear Senator', from Strom Thurmond's Daughter"], NPR.</ref> She was unaware of the identity of her biological parents until 1938, when she was 13 and her mother told her the full story. In 1941, her mother took her to meet Thurmond in person.<ref>{{citation | url = https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE4D6163FF93BA25751C1A9659C8B63&scp=5&sq=essie%20mae%20washington-williams&st=cse | newspaper = [[The New York Times]] | last = Gettleman | first = Jeffrey | title = Final Word: 'My Father's Name Was James Strom Thurmond{{'-}} | date = December 18, 2003}}.</ref>

Essie Mae and her mother met infrequently with Thurmond after that, although they had some contact for years.<ref name="Maslin">Maslin, Janet (January 17, 2005). [https://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/17/books/17masl.html?ex=1163739600&en=a42952531dbf9236&ei=5070 "A Thurmond Child Looks at Her Life and His Racism"], ''The New York Times'', retrieved March 27, 2009.</ref> After high school, she worked as a nurse at [[Harlem Hospital]] in New York City, and took a course in business education at [[New York University]].

She did not visit the [[Racial segregation in the United States|segregated]] South until 1942, when she met relatives in Edgefield. After having grown up in Pennsylvania, she was shocked by the racial restrictions of the South. She returned to the North to live with relatives during the war years. After Thurmond returned from [[World War II]], she started college at the [[Historically black colleges and universities|all-black]] [[South Carolina State University|South Carolina State College]] (SCSC) in the fall of 1947.<ref name="Dear Sen" />{{rp|128}} Thurmond quietly paid for her college education. She met and married future lawyer Julius Williams at SCSC in 1948. Her first child, Julius Williams Jr., was born in 1949. As a result, Essie Mae left college in the summer of 1949 to begin raising the first of her four children.<ref name="Dear Sen" />{{rp|151}}

==Career==
During the late 1950s and 1960s, the years of national activism in the [[civil rights movement]], Washington occasionally tried to discuss racism with Thurmond, who was known for his long-time political support for segregation, but he brushed off her complaints about segregated facilities.<ref name="Maslin" /> Nevertheless, Washington felt that she made a significant impact on Thurmond during their private conversations on race and race relations and that Thurmond's policies towards African Americans were affected as a result. In 1976, for example, Thurmond nominated [[Matthew J. Perry]],<ref>{{cite magazine |author=Kevin Brady |date=August 1, 2011 |title=Honoring Lana Hughes and JP Pritchard for 3 Decades of Service to Southeast Texas |magazine=Congressional Record|pages=E1480 |url=https://www.congress.gov/crec/2011/08/01/CREC-2011-08-01-pt1-PgE1480.pdf|access-date=January 9, 2017 |archive-date=January 10, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170110162424/https://www.congress.gov/crec/2011/08/01/CREC-2011-08-01-pt1-PgE1480.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> whom Essie Mae dated in 1947 shortly before she met her husband, to the [[U.S. Court of Military Appeals]]. Thurmond became the first Southern senator to nominate an African American for a federal judgeship.<ref name="Dear Sen" />{{rp|198}}

Following the death of her husband in 1964, Washington moved again, to [[Los Angeles]], California, where she completed her undergraduate studies to receive a bachelor's degree from [[California State University, Los Angeles]] in 1969<ref name="Dear Sen" />{{rp|187}} and earned a master's degree in education at the [[University of Southern California]],<ref name="LA Times Obit">{{Cite news|title=Essie Mae Washington-Williams dies at 87; black daughter of segregationist Strom Thurmond|url=https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-essie-mae-washington-williams-20130205-story.html|date=February 4, 2013|first=Elaine|last=Woo|work=[[Los Angeles Times]]|access-date=January 19, 2014}}</ref><ref>[http://sti.clemson.edu/events-mainmenu-32/view/22 "Dr. Essie Mae Washington"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131203025606/http://sti.clemson.edu/events-mainmenu-32/view/22 |date=2013-12-03 }}, Strom Thurmond Center, Clemson University.</ref> She had a 30-year career as a teacher in the [[Los Angeles Unified School District]] from 1967 through 1997.<ref name="Maslin" /> Washington was a longtime member of [[Delta Sigma Theta]] sorority, which she joined while at South Carolina State.

==Personal life==
In 1949, Washington left college before her junior year after marrying Julius T. Williams, a law student at SCSC, the previous year. After his graduation from law school, they moved to his home town, [[Savannah, Georgia]], where he established a law practice and was active in the [[NAACP]].<ref name="LA Times Obit" /><ref>{{Cite book|title=Strom: The Complicated Personal and Political Life of Strom Thurmond|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sTsjpEvyK7MC&pg=PA148 |isbn=978-1-58648-392-0|first1=Jack|last1=Bass|year=2006|publisher=PublicAffairs|page=148|first2=Marilyn W.|last2=Thompson|access-date=January 19, 2014}}</ref> They had two sons and two daughters together. He died in 1964. At the time of her death, Washington-Williams had 14 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/thestate/name/essie-williams-obituary?id=10807110 |title=Essie Williams Obituary (2013) |website=[[Legacy.com]] |access-date=October 18, 2024}}</ref>

In 2004, Washington-Williams said that she intended to be active on behalf of the Black Patriots Foundation, which was raising funds to build a monument on the [[National Mall]] in [[Washington, D.C.]], to honor [[African Americans in the Revolutionary War|American blacks who served in the Revolutionary War]].<ref name="jet"/> This organization became defunct the following year. Another group is now raising funds for the monument.{{citation needed|date=August 2022}}

In 2004, Washington-Williams applied for membership in the [[United Daughters of the Confederacy]] based on her heritage through Thurmond to ancestors who fought as Confederate soldiers.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/02/us/thurmond-s-biracial-daughter-seeks-to-join-confederacy-group.html|title=Thurmond's Biracial Daughter Seeks to Join Confederacy Group|work=The New York Times|date=July 2, 2004}}</ref> She died before being accepted.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.glamour.com/story/the-secret-fight-to-save-confederate-monuments|title=The Secret Fight to Save Confederate Monuments|work=Glamour.com|date=August 16, 2018}}</ref> She also intended to join the [[Daughters of the American Revolution]].<ref name="jet">[https://web.archive.org/web/20050525033029/http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_3_106/ai_n6153480 "Daughter of late Sen. Strom Thurmond to join Confederacy group"], ''Jet'', July 19, 2004, retrieved March 26, 2009.</ref>

Washington-Williams was a [[Congregationalism in the United States|Congregationalist]].<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-essie-mae-washington-williams-20130205-story.html|title=Essie Mae Washington-Williams dies at 87; black daughter of segregationist Strom Thurmond|work=Los Angeles Times|date=February 4, 2013}}</ref>

==Death==
Washington-Williams died February 4, 2013, in [[Columbia, South Carolina]], at age 87.<ref>{{cite web|title=Strom Thurmond's Daughter, Essie Mae Washington Williams, Dies |url=http://www.wltx.com/news/article/220051/2/Strom-Thurmonds-Daughter-Essie-Mae-Washington-Williams-Dies- |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130217021947/http://www.wltx.com/news/article/220051/2/Strom-Thurmonds-Daughter-Essie-Mae-Washington-Williams-Dies- |url-status=dead |archive-date=February 17, 2013 |publisher=WLTX.TV |access-date=February 5, 2013 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www2.wspa.com/news/2013/feb/04/strom-thurmonds-mixed-race-daughter-dies-87-ar-5521191/ |title=Strom Thurmond's Mixed-race Daughter Dies At 87 |access-date=February 4, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130217021331/http://www2.wspa.com/news/2013/feb/04/strom-thurmonds-mixed-race-daughter-dies-87-ar-5521191/ |archive-date=February 17, 2013 }}</ref>

==Legacy and honors==
[[File:Strom Thurmond's statue with Essie Mae added.jpg|thumb|Strom Thurmond's statue with Essie Mae added. In the phrase "The father of four children", the "four" was replaced with "five".]]
When Washington-Williams announced her family connection, it was acknowledged by the Thurmond family.<ref name="Janofsky" /> In 2004, the state legislature approved the addition of her name to the list of Thurmond children on a monument for Senator Thurmond on the South Carolina Statehouse grounds.<ref name="jet"/>

In 2005, Washington-Williams was awarded an honorary Doctorate in education from South Carolina State University at Orangeburg when she was invited to speak at their commencement ceremony.{{citation needed|date=August 2022}}

She published a memoir, ''Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond'' (2005), written with [[William Stadiem]]. It explored her sense of dislocation based on her mixed heritage, as well as going to college in the [[Racial segregation in the United States|segregated]] [[southern United States|South]] after having grown up in Pennsylvania.<ref name="Maslin" /> It was nominated for both a [[National Book Award]] and a [[Pulitzer Prize]].
{{clear}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
*Essie Mae Washington-Williams and William Stadiem, ''Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond'', Regan Books, 2005. {{ISBN|0-06-076095-8}}.
*Jack Bass and [[Marilyn W. Thompson]], ''Ol' Strom: An Unauthorized Biography of Strom Thurmond'', University of South Carolina Press, 2003. {{ISBN|1-57003-514-8}}.
*Jack Bass and Marilyn W. Thompson, ''Strom: The Complicated Personal and Political Life of Strom Thurmond'', Public Affairs, 2005. {{ISBN|1-58648-297-1}}.

==External links==
*Gross, Terry, [https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4473680 {{"'}}Dear Senator', from Strom Thurmond's Daughter"], Interview, National Public Radio, February 1, 2005.
*Rather, Dan, [https://web.archive.org/web/20031221192837/http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/12/17/60II/main589107.shtml "Essie Mae Washington-Williams"], Interview, CBS ''60 Minutes II'', December 17, 2003
*[https://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/29/us/national-briefing-south-south-carolina-biracial-child-added-to-thurmond-monument.html "South Carolina: Biracial Child Added To Thurmond Monument"], ''New York Times'', June 29, 2004
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20101105214005/http://www.frankkwheaton.com/Essie_Mae_W._Williams.html More about Essie Mae Washington-Williams], Frank Wheaton Official Website
* {{Find a Grave|104658908}}
*{{C-SPAN|1008628}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Washington-Williams, Essie Mae}}
[[Category:1925 births]]
[[Category:2013 deaths]]
[[Category:African-American schoolteachers]]
[[Category:American people of English descent]]
[[Category:Thurmond family]]
[[Category:Schoolteachers from California]]
[[Category:American women educators]]
[[Category:California State University, Los Angeles alumni]]
[[Category:People from Coatesville, Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:People from Edgefield, South Carolina]]
[[Category:South Carolina State University alumni]]
[[Category:New York University Stern School of Business alumni]]
[[Category:University of Southern California alumni]]
[[Category:USC Rossier School of Education alumni]]
[[Category:American women memoirists]]
[[Category:American memoirists]]
[[Category:Writers from California]]
[[Category:Writers from South Carolina]]
[[Category:American Congregationalists]]
[[Category:Protestants from California]]
[[Category:Protestants from South Carolina]]
[[Category:African-American Christians]]
[[Category:Delta Sigma Theta members]]
[[Category:Writers from Chester County, Pennsylvania]]