Outside the book she is known to have come from "Yurok aristocracy" and to be married to a Euro-American man named Milton "Jim" Thompson.

[5][6] Born October 29, 1856 in Pec-Wan Village, Lucy Thompson was a member of the Yurok Tribe, located in Northern California.

[3] in 1875, she married Jim Thompson, a white timber cruiser who was also an important figure in the local Masonic Lodge.

[2] Lucy Thompson's major work is her nonfiction, biographical book To the American Indian: Reminiscences of a Yurok Woman, originally published in 1916.

[5] The book explores Thompson's own life and upbringing, as well as other members of the Yurok tribe, in late nineteenth and early twentieth century California.