She was born while her father was studying veterinary medicine at Cornell University. His work took the family to rural Oklahoma, where she grew up with six siblings during the Depression and Dust Bowl.
After graduating from high school, she joined the Women's Army Corps and trained as a surgical technician. She supported herself as a medical technician and a model, posing for painters and fine-art photographers until she was in her 80s.
She was one of the US's first abortion-rights activists. In the decades after Roe v. Wade, she widened her activism to include gay rights, animal rights and environmental issues.