Atlanta resident and writer Carolyn Curry will discuss her current biography, Suffer and Grow Strong, The Life of Ella Gertrude Clanton Thomas, 1834-1907, at the Tuesday, Oct. 7 luncheon meeting of Titus II at Fayetteville First United Methodist Church. The event will be held in the Family Life Center at noon.
Tickets are $6 and can be reserved by calling the church office at 770-461-4313 by Oct. 2.
Gertrude Thomas was a wealthy plantation owner’s daughter and a planter’s wife in the glory days before the Civil War. She suffered during the turmoil of the war and Reconstruction and moved forward to embrace the most progressive issues of her time, particularly the vote for women, gender equality, and the wrong of slavery.
Thomas made such significant contributions as starting a school and becoming president of the Georgia Woman Suffrage Association the first time it met in convention in 1899.
Curry has devoted more than 25 years studying Thomas’s 41-year diary of 450,000 words, 15 scrapbooks, and legal documents in order to chronicle a life covering almost 60 years.
Curry received a B.A. in English from Agnes Scott College and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in history from Georgia State University. She is also the founder and chair of Women Alone Together, a non-profit foundation created to meet the needs of women who are alone.
Curry also is the wife of former National Football League player, college coach, and ESPN analyst Bill Curry.
