‘Good Morning America’ anchor Robin Roberts announces children’s book honoring her late mother

LOUISVILLE — Joyfully remembering her mother Lucimarian Roberts — whose gentle presence and angelic voice graced many Presbyterian spaces throughout her lifetime — Robin Roberts announced the release on Tuesday of a new children’s book celebrating her late mother.

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In a Tuesday Facebook post, Robin Roberts described “Lucy Sings on Lucy Street,” written by her siblings, Sally-Ann Roberts and Lawrence “Butch” Roberts, as “a beautiful book about how momma shared her passion for music and the impact it had on her life.”

“My mother was filled with music ever since she was a little, little girl,” said Roberts during an interview with her siblings on “Good Morning America,” the nationally televised morning news program she co-anchors. “She used it to share joy, to inspire, and she uplifted people with her music.”

Roberts, who was raised in the Presbyterian Church and memorably spoke at the 214th General Assembly (2002) Breakfast in Columbus, Ohio, also contributed her own reflections to her mother’s 2012 memoir, “My Story, My Song: Mother-Daughter Reflections on Life and Faith.”

The new children’s book, set in 1932 during the Great Depression, also addresses the realities Lucimarian Roberts faced growing up in Akron, Ohio, as a person of color, “a rare sight to many of the European immigrants in the neighborhood,” according to the book.

“Momma, as a young girl, she sees her neighbors and they innocently say to her, ‘Can you wash the color,’ because they had not seen someone who looked like momma,” said Roberts in the televised interview. “And momma laughs it off and says, ‘Can you wash off the freckles?’”

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Both of Roberts’ parents were active at all levels of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Her father, Lawrence "Larry" Roberts, a famed Tuskegee Airman who died in October 2004, was in the class of 1944 at Tuskegee and rose to the rank of colonel. He was a former vice moderator of the General Assembly Council, served as moderator of the Presbytery of Mississippi, was a member of the Mountain Retreat Association Board of Directors (Montreat Conference Center) and was an elder at First Presbyterian Church, Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

Lucimarian Roberts, who died in 2012, served on the Permanent Judicial Commission of Mississippi Presbytery, the National Committee for the Self-Development of People, the board of trustees of Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Georgia, and the board of the Presbyterian Investment and Loan Program. She also co-chaired the Mission Initiative: Joining Hearts and Hands, a $40 million campaign to raise funds for church growth in the U.S. and for mission service workers overseas.