Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans (February 21, 1920 – January 25, 2012) was an American heiress, activist, politician, and philanthropist.

Pushed by her mother and with the support of her childhood governess, Mary went back to Duke University as a student for three more semesters.

While back at Duke, she met James Hustead Semans, a urologic surgeon visiting from Atlanta.

[4] Growing up in New York City, Semans listened daily to her mother's opera singing and took private piano and dance lessons of her own.

[4] For some time, Mary Duke Semans played an active role in the Durham City Government, although she never served in a post higher than a local office.

While in office, she spent much of her time pushing for civil rights, funding for the arts, and affordable housing and healthcare.

[6] Semans created and supported many institutions at Duke University, in her hometown Durham, and in the larger State of North Carolina.

[1] Through these institutions Semans spent most of her life funding and promoting education, arts, and human rights in general.

Through membership on this board they helped support many arts and cultural programs in New York City, the Carolinas, and Duke University.

[10] The second, the Duke-Semans Fine Arts Foundation, was created very specifically to send artwork on tour to places that would otherwise never receive any.

[2] In an interview, she claimed to have first entered her city's political scene after attending a precinct meeting and seeing a racial division in a decision that would help Durham African Americans register to vote.

Her involvement in that meeting led her to run for the City Council and eventually as Mayor of Durham on a platform of black voter registration.

[18] Washington Duke first came to philanthropy through the Methodist church, although he was influenced by the larger Social Gospel movement and had interest in quieting critics of his tobacco trust.

[18] The biggest of these donations, encouraged mostly by Benjamin Duke, was $85,000 to Trinity College of Randolph County in effort to move it to Durham.

While she and her family were not greatly affected, it was then when she first gained knowledge of others' terrible needs, leading her to believe that those of affluence have a responsibility to give.

The posthumous recognition was bestowed upon 29 individuals "whose dedication, accomplishments and passion have helped shape Durham in important ways.

"[20] The lichen species Parmelia semansiana was named in her honour by William and Chicita Culberson, both researchers at Duke University.