“I always had a pressure to succeed; … we’ve been a success-oriented family. This became a problem for others … to adjust to their stereotypes, that Blacks could compete with or surpass whites, … that Blacks were individuals and personalities, some you liked and some you didn’t.”
Those were the words of Anita Lyons Bond, a noted St. Louis civil rights activist, former St. Louis school board president and fierce advocate for education who died last week at age 95.
In the 1975 interview with St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Jake McCarthy, Bond talked about her life growing up in segregated St. Louis, her family’s Christian values, her educational goals and her strong commitment to public education — shaped by her prophetic warning about what could happen if schools were neglected.
“If we lose the public schools, or let them keep failing, we will lose the whole concept of a democratic society, and then you will have an elitist group and an alienated group and then you have to deal with the alienated,” Bond told McCarthy.
Anita Grace Lyons was born in St. Louis, on July 6, 1930, to Alvin and Beatrice Lyons. She was the eldest of six children. She married Dr. Leslie Fee Bond, a surgeon, and they had three children: Leslie Jr., Eric and Candace.
“She made our family proud and inspired generations of students, parents and teachers to use education as a way to uplift individuals, families and the city of St. Louis,” her daughter said in an interview two years ago.
McCarthy wrote that Bond and her late husband lived in a “stately home” on Lindell Avenue at the time. However, she told him she grew up on Lucas Avenue in north St. Louis.
Bond was the valedictorian of her graduating Sumner High School class and the first Black undergraduate student at Saint Louis University to graduate with honors.
“I was preoccupied. I had a goal,” Bond said, describing her high school years. “I was prepared at Sumner to be the first Black undergraduate (at SLU) because we knew the time was coming.”
In 1950, Bond earned her bachelor’s degree and became the first female African American student at St. Louis University admitted into three societies: Pi Lambda Theta, the National Jesuit Honor Society, and Gamma Phi Epsilon now known as Alpha Sigma Nu. In 2015, SLU awarded Bond an honorary doctorate.
Although she grew up in an era of segregation and racial oppression, Bond said her family’s Christian values helped her navigate bias and racism.
“My attitude toward them was ‘Father forgive them for they know not what they do.’ I knew that if whites allowed themselves to become part of a Black family, they would be changed by the contact,” she said.
Bond’s son, Les Bond, Jr., discussed his mother with The St. Louis American 10 years ago, recalling how she took him to a Jefferson Bank demonstration in 1963 when he was 6. He was struck by her unwavering courage and how images of his mother and William Clay, Sr., who went on to become Missouri’s first Black congressman, impacted his young consciousness.
“It was this visual optic of our mother and Rep. William Clay as a revolutionary that we all saw as kids and admired in our mother,” he told The American. “It wasn’t as if she was just talking about social justice. She was showing us what it took to achieve social justice and the courage you had to have to be out there on the frontlines pushing for civil rights.”
Clay, also a SLU alum, died last month at age 94.
“The passing of Anita Bond and Congressman Clay within weeks is the passing of two real serious St. Louis icons,” said Virvus Jones, a former city comptroller and civil rights activist. “Both of them were trailblazers at Saint Louis University.”
Jones recalled that in the 1970s, Bond was instrumental in getting funds from Jack and Jill of America, Inc. for a St. Louis after-school program to help Black students prepare for the ACT and ACT tests. “She used to get Jack and Jill, Inc. to give us $30,000 a year… and $30,000, in 1971, was a lot of money!”
In 1965, Bond challenged the Missouri Board of Education’s elections. Her lawsuit, contending civil rights violations, went to the state Supreme Court and ultimately resulted in changes in election procedures. She established the Citizens Education Task Force, an organization funded through the Danforth Foundation that functioned as an independent critical body of the Board of Education.
The St. Louis Globe Democrat honored Bond in 1968, as a “Woman of Achievement in Human Relations. She was elected president of the St. Louis Board of Education in 1974 and was involved with helping Harris-Stowe become established as a state college rather than a secondary school.
In 1981, federal Judge James Meredith appointed Bond to serve on the committee that wrote the St. Louis Public Schools desegregation plan.
Michael McMillan, president and CEO of the Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis, said Bond was a founding member of the Urban League Guild and its first president as well as an Urban League board member.
“She embodied grace, class, elegance and sophistication in everything that she did,” McMillan said. “She was a devoted wife, mother and mentor to countless people locally and nationally. Her legacy will never be forgotten.”
Former St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones, the first Black woman to hold the position, praised Bond for “blazing a trail for women like me.”
“She was the epitome of Black Girl Magic before it became such a popular catchphrase, and women leaders in St. Louis and beyond owe a debt of gratitude to the glass ceilings Mrs. Bond shattered in her lifetime,” Jones said.
St. Louis American Publisher Donald M. Suggs praised Bond for her leadership and the depth of her influence.
“Anita was a consequential leader who challenged prevailing racial biases and practices in education and other economic and social spheres,” Suggs said. “She will always be remembered as an outspoken visionary, activist and advocate who used her considerable intellectual gifts and organizational skills to benefit others. I, like so many others, was a beneficiary of her counsel and empathy and held her in the highest regard and esteem.”
Bond lectured on the topic of Black Studies at St. Louis University, Fontbonne College, Maryville College and many other colleges, community groups and institutions. During an interview for a journalism project in 2014, Bond urged SLU students to keep steadfastly working toward equality.
“Start where you are. Work where you are,” she said. “If you see discrimination, if you see somebody hurting, ask them what’s bothering them.”
Bond leaves behind a legacy as a fearless proponent of equal rights, arts and education, political and criminal justice and church and family. In a public statement her family wrote:
“Her strong voice and sweet spirit will remain etched in our hearts forever.”
Sylvester Brown Jr. is the Deaconess Foundation Community Advocacy Fellow.
Memorial services for Anita L. Bond will be held on Saturday, September 6, 2025 at Central Baptist Church, 2842 Washington Ave., St. Louis, Missouri, 63103, at 10:00 a.m. In lieu of flowers, the Bond family requests that memorial
contributions be made to:
Erik L. Bond ’77 Memorial Financial Aid Fund
MICDS
Development Office
101 N. Warson Road
St. Louis, MO 63124
It is with a heavy heart to learn of the passing of Anita Bond I had the pleasure of being a guest at the home of Anita’s parents Mr. And Mrs. Lyons as my brother Andrew “Mickey” Davis was married to Vivian Lyons sister of Anita. Anita will be missed and her memory will hold a special spot in the hearts of so many St. Louis natives. Rest in Peace Anita Lyons Bond. Brenda Davis Holland a native of St. Louis which holds very special memories of growing up in St. Louis. I have lived in Los Angeles for more than forty years. Please accept my sincere sympathy to the family.