Clifton Van Brunt Lewis

Clifton Van Brunt was born and raised in Tallahassee, Florida. She graduated from the Florida State College for Women (now Florida State University) in 1940, and went on to marry George Lewis II, a banker, thus intertwining two of Tallahassee's oldest families.

Clifton was an activist in the Civil Rights movement in Tallahassee, as well as an advocate for arts and culture in the community. In addition to founding the Randall-Lewis House, she was instrumental in beginning the Tallahassee Junior Museum (now Tallahassee Museum) and the LeMoyne Center for the Visual Arts. Clifton's art gallery originally started in the lobby of the Lewis State Bank, her husband's family business, and then expanded into the Randall House Gallery.

Despite the tensions among Black and white citizens in the South at the time, Clifton encouraged social intermingling, and hosted events at her home, the Spring House, that included guests of both races. She offered the Randall-Lewis House as a sanctuary to Patricia Stephens Due, a FAMU student and Congress Of Racial Equality (CORE) leader of the local lunch counter sit-ins. Clifton dared to support all persons in her community when few others would.