Thelma Frazier Winter was born Thelma Frazier in Gnadenhutten, Ohio, to Robert Frazier and Esther Eggenberg. Her family was descended from early Moravian settlers. She grew up in New Philadelphia, Ohio.
Encouraged by her mother, she went on to study at the Cleveland School of Art, where she focused on ceramics and worked with Julius Mihalik and R. Guy Cowan.
She completed her degree in 1929.
She worked at Cowan Pottery and belonged to the Cleveland School of artists. Winter then worked for a time at Cowan Pottery before leaving in the early 1930s to pursue a degree in art education at Western Reserve University. She would go on to teach at the Laurel School in Cleveland as well as the Cleveland Institute of Artist
They were longtime residents of the University Circle neighborhood of Cleveland.
Thelma Winter died of cancer in 1977, and is buried in Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio.
