Helen Lemme
Helen Lemme opened her house in Iowa City to others when they did not have a place to call home.
During the 1930s and 1940s, Lemme and her husband, Allyn, regularly opened their home to black University of Iowa students, particularly black athletes. Black students were barred from university housing until 1946.
Her home at 603 S. Capitol St. in Iowa City became a gathering point for the slowly growing black community.
Born in 1904 in Grinnell, the oldest of six children, Lemme graduated from the State University of Iowa — now the University of Iowa — in 1928. She married her husband a year later and the couple had two sons, Paul and Lawrence.
Frances Helen Renfrow Lemme, better known as Helen Lemme, worked as a research technician in the university’s Department of Internal Medicine, but is better known for her work as a civil rights activist and community leader.
She was active in many organizations, including the Iowa City Area Council of Churches, the YMCA and the Girl Scouts. She served as secretary of the Johnson County Advisory Board of the Hawkeye Area Community Action Program and in various leadership positions with the League of Women Voters of Johnson County.
Her political activism in the Democratic Party continued to the national stage, helping gain more representation for black people at the Democratic National Convention. Lemme also helped bring the council-manager form of government to Iowa City.
Lemme was named Iowa City’s first Woman of the Year in 1955 and was the first black woman to be named Citizen of the Year.
She died Dec. 15, 1968, at the age of 64 from inhaling smoke during a fire in her home. Helen Lemme Elementary School, located at 3100 Washington St. in Iowa City, was named in her honor when it opened in 1970.