Essie Mae Washington was raised by her maternal aunt and uncle, and was not told that Thurmond was her father until she was in high school, when she met him for the first time. She later married, took on the last name Washington-Williams, had a family, and retired as a Los Angeles Unified School District elementary school teacher with a master's degree. Though the Thurmond family never publicly acknowledged Washington-Williams as his daughter while he was alive, he helped pay her way through a historically black college in South Carolina and continued to give her financial support well into her adult life. Washington-Williams said she did not reveal she was Thurmond's daughter during his lifetime because it "wasn't to the advantage of either one of us". She kept silent out of respect for her father and denied the two had agreed she would not reveal her connection to him.