Hurley, Ruby (1909–1980)

Born in Virginia, Hurley became active in civil rights in the 1930s. In 1943, she became the national Youth Secretary for the NAACP and established the first permanent NAACP office in the Deep South. She served in several leadership positions within the NAACP and worked alongside Amzie Moore and Medgar Evers on civil rights issues in the Mississippi Delta, investigating the murder of Emmett Till, working on the case of Autherine Lucy, and engaging with Roy Wilkins and Thurgood Marshall. In the 1960s, she became nationally prominent on local and national television. She was one of the first women of color to be seen as a black feminist activist.