Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti

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Chief

Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti

Photo of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti standing with hands clasped together in front of her
Ransome-Kuti in 1970
Born
Frances Abigail Olufunmilayo Olufela Folorunso Thomas

(1900-10-25)25 October 1900
Died13 April 1978(1978-04-13) (aged 77)
, Nigeria
Occupations
  • Educator
  • politician
  • women's rights activist
Spouse
(m. 1925; died 1955)
Children
Relatives
AwardsLenin Peace Prize (1970)

suffragist, and women's rights
activist.

Fumilayo Ransome Kuti was born in Abeokuta in what is now in Ogun State, and was the first female student to attend the Abeokuta Grammar School.[1] As a young adult, she worked as a teacher, organizing some of the first preschool classes in the country and arranging literacy classes for lower-income women.

During the 1940s, Ransome-Kuti established the

women’s right to vote
and became a noted member of international peace and women's rights movements.

Ransome-Kuti received the Lenin Peace Prize and was awarded membership in the Order of the Niger for her work. In her later years, she supported her sons' criticism of Nigeria's military governments. She died at the age of 77 after being wounded in a military raid on family property. Ransome-Kuti's children included the musician Fela Kuti (born Olufela Ransome-Kuti), doctor and activist Beko Ransome-Kuti, and health minister Olikoye Ransome-Kuti.

Early life and education

Frances Abigail Olufunmilayo Olufela Folorunso Thomas was born on 25 October 1900 in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Nigeria, which at the time was a part of the Southern Nigeria Protectorate, a Protectorate of the British Empire.[3] She was born to Chief Daniel Olumeyuwa Thomas (1869–1954), a member of the aristocratic Jibolu-Taiwo family, and Lucretia Phyllis Omoyeni Adeosolu (1874–1956).[2]: 20  Her father farmed and traded palm produce, and her mother worked as a dressmaker.[4]

Frances' father was born to Ebenezer Sobowale Thomas, who was himself born in

Freetown, Sierra Leone, and Abigail Fakemi, who was born in the Yoruba town of Ilesa. Frances' oldest known paternal ancestor was her paternal great-grandmother, Sarah Taiwo (mother of Ebenezer Sobowale Thomas), a Yoruba woman who had been captured by slave traders in the early 19th century before eventually returning home to her family in Abeokuta. Sarah's first husband was Sobowale Thomas. Sarah's descendants through Thomas and her other two husbands - the Jibolu-Taiwos - became some of the first Christians in the area, and had a large influence on the growth of Christianity in Abeokuta
.

Frances' mother was born to Isaac Adeosolu, who was from Abeokuta, and Harriet, the daughter of Adeboye, who was from the ancient Yoruba town of

Ile-Ife. Her parents married in 1897, and they had two children who died in infancy before Frances was born.[2]
: 19–23 

An aerial view of Abeokuta in 1929
Abeokuta in 1929
Image of Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti seated, with husband and children
Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti (centre) with husband and children c. 1940

Although it was uncommon at the time for Nigerian families to invest in much education for girls, Frances' parents believed in the importance of education for both boys and girls.[2]: 28  She attended Abeokuta Grammar School for her secondary education.[5] The school had initially been open only to male students, but it admitted its first female students in 1914, and Frances was first among the six girls registered for study that year.[2]: 28–29  From 1919 to 1922, she went abroad and attended a finishing school for girls in Cheshire, England, where she learned elocution, music, dressmaking, French, and various domestic skills. It was there that she made the permanent decision to use her shortened Yoruba name, Funmilayo, instead of her Christian name Frances,[2]: 30–31  likely in response to personal experiences of racism in England.[6] Afterwards, she returned to Abeokuta and worked as a teacher.[3]

On 20 January 1925, Funmilayo married Reverend Israel Oludotun Ransome-Kuti, a member of the Ransome-Kuti family.[2]: 33  Israel had studied at the Abeokuta Grammar School several years ahead of Funmilayo, and while she was still in school the two had developed a friendship followed by a courtship.[2]: 29  Israel found work as a school principal, and he strongly believed in bringing people together and overcoming ethnic and regional divisions. He later became a co-founder of both the Nigeria Union of Teachers and of the Nigerian Union of Students.[2]: 46–47  His marriage with Funmilayo would last 30 years – until Israel's death – and was marked by a sense of equality and deep mutual respect between the couple.[2]: 42 

After marriage, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti had quit her old job as a teacher, but she soon found other projects. In 1928 she established one of the first preschool classes in Nigeria. Around the same time, she started a club for young women of elite families to encourage their "self-improvement", while also organizing classes for

illiterate women.[2]: 38  Between 1935 and 1936, the couple arranged to purchase a secondhand car and had it shipped to them from England. Ransome-Kuti was the first woman in Abeokuta to drive a car.[2]
: 48 

Ransome-Kuti and her husband had four children: a daughter named Dolupo (1926) and sons Olikoye "Koye" (1927), Olufela "Fela" (1938), and Bekololari "Beko" (1940).[2]: 47 & 49 

Activism

Abeokuta Women's Union