Abstract Helen Jackson Claytor (1907-2005) was the first African-American president of the national YWCA. She lived much of her life in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Claytor sought to bring equal rights to women, children, widowed persons and orphans, and advocated for rights to justice, housing, education, health and death with dignity, as well as freedom from racial and other prejudices. Locally, Claytor was the first African-American president of the Grand Rapids YWCA and, among other...