Frankie Muse Freeman was born on November 24, 1916 in Danville, Virginia, the oldest of eight children. Throughout her childhood, her parents, Maud and William B. Muse, Sr., emphasized education, hard work, and community involvement. Growing up in the segregated South, Frankie was surrounded by discrimination, and she became passionate about fighting for justice and equality. Initially focused on racial issues, Frankie would expand her fight to encompass all forms of discrimination, including gender and age.

After graduating high school, Frankie attended Hampton Institute, her mother’s alma mater. While at Hampton, she decided that the law would be her best tool in the fight against injustice. As she writes in her memoir, A Song of Faith and Hope, “I wanted to change things, to do something that would be effective” [pg 22]. She left Hampton to try to attend law school in New York City, but once there, discovered that the school didn’t recognize credits from African American institutions like Hampton. Instead, she became involved in a politically active church group that was fighting discrimination. Through this group, she met Shelby T. Freeman, who was in New York to attend Columbia Teacher’s College graduate program. They married on December 15, 1938, and their daughter Shelbe Patricia “Pat” Freeman was born in August 1939.

The family moved to Washington, D. C. when Shelby took a job with the Department of the Army in March 1941. In 1944, Frankie again decided to pursue law school, and she started at Howard University School of Law that September. Her second child, Shelby “Butch” Freeman III was born in September 1946, at the start of Frankie’s third and final year of school. She returned to classes two weeks after his birth and graduated second in her class in May 1947.

At the age of ten months, Butch was diagnosed with viral encephalitis. He would later suffer severe complications from this disease, including blindness, inability to walk, and limited communication skills due to severe brain damage. He passed away at the age of 11 in May 1958.

The Freemans moved to St. Louis in 1948 to be near Shelby’s parents. Frankie started to look for work as a trial lawyer but was consistently denied opportunities due to both her race and her gender. She opened her own practice in June 1949, at first taking criminal defendants and then shifting to civil law. She joined the NAACP and became part of the St. Louis team for the Legal Defense Fund.

In 1952, Frankie served as the lead counsel on a landmark civil rights case that effectively ended racial segregation in low-income public housing in St. Louis. The Cochran public housing project had opened in 1953, and it was the only new housing available for low-income families during a time of severe housing shortages. However, Cochran was designated for white families only. Black families were told to wait for the Pruitt public housing project, not scheduled to open until 1955. Frankie argued that this denied black applicants equality of opportunity, and in 1954, the courts ruled in her favor. After the legal battle was over, Frankie was offered a job as associate general counsel for the Housing Authority. She accepted and served in that position until 1970.

Frankie joined Delta Sigma Theta, a national public service sorority for college-trained African American women, in 1950. She was very active in the organization and served as the 14th national president from 1967-1971.

At the same time as she was active in Delta Sigma Theta and working as a lawyer with the Housing Authority, Frankie was nominated by President Johnson to serve as a commissioner to the United States Commission on Civil Rights. Frankie had previously served as a charter member of the Missouri State Advisory Committee, which reported to the Commission on issues facing Missouri. Frankie’s nomination was confirmed by the Senate on September 15, 1964, and she was sworn in by her friend Judge Marjorie Lawson. Frankie served on the Commission for 16 years, until 1981. She was the first woman to serve as a commissioner, and she was the only woman and the only African American during her time on the Commission.

In 1979, Frankie was appointed by President Carter to serve as Inspector General of the Community Services Administration (CSA), and she held this role until January 1981. She also continued to work as a commissioner on the Civil Rights Commission until her replacement was confirmed in July 1980.

Throughout her life, Frankie served on numerous national and local boards and was involved in countless organizations fighting to end discrimination and inequality, as well as groups that sought to build bridges between communities. She was also passionate about helping children, writing in her memoir that “Butch is one of the reasons I have always done whatever I can for children” [pg 53]. This included her work as a board member of the Herbert Hoover Boys and Girls Club, a member of the steering committee of the Urban League Youth Development Fund, and chairing a scholarship fund at Washington Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church. Frankie was also involved with the NAACP; National Council of Negro Women; National Council on the Aging; National Council of Community and Justice; Girl Scouts of the USA; Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights; United Way of St. Louis; St. Louis Urban League; YWCA; Health and Welfare Council of St. Louis; Metropolitan Zoological Park and Museum District; St. Louis Black Leadership Roundtable; World Affairs Council of St. Louis; African American Jewish Task Force; and St. Louis Community Monitoring and Support Task Force, to name a few.

Shelby died in St. Louis in July 1991 after suffering six heart attacks in five years. After the death of her husband, Frankie continued her active involvement in local and national affairs. She died in St. Louis on January 12, 2018, at the age of 101.